Pub - The United States 1763 2000 Spotlight History

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10111 The United States,
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20111 The United States, 1763–2001 is a new approach to teaching and learning US history from 1763 to 2001 at
1 A-level. It meets the needs of teachers and students studying for today’s revised AS and A2 exams.
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3 In a unique style, The United States, 1763–2001 focuses on the key topics within the period. Each topic is
4 then comprehensively explored to provide background, essay writing advice and examples, source work
5 and historical skills exercises.
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7 From 1763 to 2001, the key topics featured include:
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9 • The struggle for the Constitution, 1763–1877
30 • The American Civil War, its causes and aftermath
1 • The ‘Roaring Twenties’
2 • Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal
3 • Foreign policy, 1890–2001
4 • Civil rights, 1863–2001
5 • Domestic policy, 1960–2001
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7 Using essay styles and source exercises from each of the exam boards, AQA, Edexcel and OCR, this book
8 is an essential text and revision guide for students and teachers.
9
40 John Spiller is Course Leader in History and Politics at Ashton-under-Lyne Sixth Form College. He has
1 written articles for A-level magazines, including History Review and is an A-level examiner.
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Tim Clancey teaches History at Edinburgh Academy and has been an A-level examiner.
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4 Stephen Young teaches History and Politics at Ashton-under-Lyne Sixth Form College.
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Simon Mosley teaches History at Babington Community Technology School, Leicester.
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Spotlight History
Britain, 1846–1919
Jocelyn Hunt
Europe, 1890–1945
Stephen J. Lee
Britain in the Twentieth Century

Ian Cawood
The United States, 1763–2000

John Spiller, Tim Clancey, Stephen Young and Simon Mosley
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The United States,
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1763–2001
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First published 2005
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada

by Routledge
270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
© 2005 John Spiller, Tim Clancey, Stephen Young and Simon Mosley
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

The United States, 1763–2001/John Spiller . . . [et al.].
p. cm. – (Spotlight history)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. United States – History – Textbooks. 2. United States – History – Study
and teaching (Secondary). I. Spiller, John. II. Series.
E178.1.U544 2004
973 – dc22 2004004552
ISBN 0-203-64210-4 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-67449-9 (Adobe eReader Format)

ISBN 0–415–29028–7 (hbk)
ISBN 0–415–29029–5 (pbk)
1111
2111
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4111 Contents
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10111 List of illustrations vii
1 Acknowledgements viii
2 General Introduction ix
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5 1 An Introduction to the Period 1
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7 2 The Struggle for the Constitution, 1763–1877 4
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9 3 The Origins of the American Civil War, 1840–1861 35
20111
1 4 The American Civil War, 1861–1865 64
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3 5 Politics, Reform and Westwards Expansion, 1865–1919 93
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5 6 Boom and Bust: Economy and Society, 1919–1933 129
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7 7 Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, 1933–1941 157
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9 8 Foreign Policy, 1890–1941 189
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1 9 Foreign Policy, 1941–2001 217
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3 10 Civil Rights, 1863–2001 249
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5 11 Domestic Policy from Kennedy to Bush, 1961–2001 275
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7 12 General Conclusion: From AS to A2 303
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40 Biographies of Important Personalities 308
1 Glossary of Key Terms 319
2 Select Bibliography 325
3 Index 326
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4111 List of Illustrations
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10111 2.1 Map illustrating how the United States was formed 7
1 2.2 George Washington at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, 1787 10
2 2.3 Thomas Jefferson 12
3 2.4 Map illustrating the Missouri Compromise, 1820 13
4 3.1 Stephen A. Douglas 38
5 3.2 Anti-slavery cartoon, 1839 39
6 3.3 Map illustrating slave and free states on the eve of the American Civil War 41
7 3.4 Campaign banner showing Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin 44
8 4.1 General Robert E. Lee 66
9 4.2 Confederate soldiers captured at Gettysburg 68
20111 4.3 Emaciated Union Army soldier after his release from Andersonville Prison Camp, 1865 70
1 5.1 Pie-charts showing sources of immigration, 1860–1920 106
2 5.2 Immigrants arriving in America around 1910 107
3 5.3 The Ludlow Massacre 110
4 6.1 Ku Klux Klan, c.1920 132
5 6.2 Jury of the Scopes ‘Monkey Trial’ 132
6 6.3 Boom and bust cartoon 137
7 7.1 Migratory Mexican field worker’s home, California 160
8 7.2 Cartoon illustrating how the Depression affected farms 161
9 8.1 Theodore Roosevelt surrounded by his ‘Rough Riders’, 1898 192
30 8.2 Map to show the war in the Pacific 195
1 9.1 The Marshall Plan helping Western Europe 220
2 9.2 National Security Council during the Cuban missile crisis 222
3 9.3 Map to show the Iron Curtain 223
4 10.1 Public hanging in Kentucky 253
5 10.2 Muhammad Ali addresses the Black Muslim Annual Convention, 1968 257
6 10.3 Black athletes giving the Black Power salute during the Olympic Games, 1968 258
7 11.1 John F. Kennedy with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna, 1961 277
8 11.2 Elvis Presley with President Richard Nixon, 1971 280
9 11.3 President Clinton with former Presidents George Bush, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter
40 and Gerald Ford at the funeral of Richard Nixon, 1994 282
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Acknowledgements
The author and publishers would like to thank the following for permission to reproduce material:
Bettmann/CORBIS (Figures 2.2, 3.1, 4.2, 4.3, 6.1, 6.2, 8.1, 10.2); CORBIS (Figure 9.2); The Library of
Congress (Figures 3.4, 4.1, 7.1); Monticello/Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Inc. (Figure 2.3); Denver Public
Library (Figure 5.3); Brown Brothers Stock Photos (Figures 5.2, 10.1); popperfoto.com (Figure 10.3); Rex
Features Limited (Figures 11.1, 11.2); AP Photo/Bud Krogh/White House (Figure 11.3).
While every effort has been made to trace and acknowledge ownership of copyright material used in this
volume, the publishers will be glad to make suitable arrangements with any copyright holders whom it has
not been possible to contact.
1111
2111
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4111 General Introduction
5
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10111 The aim of this book is to help prepare you for exam board modules in AS and A-level History. Each
1 chapter is divided into standard parts, the purpose of which is to combine essential knowledge and the
2 various skills necessary to achieve the highest grade in line with the AS and A-level specifications. This
3 General Introduction concentrates on AS format but most chapters in the book also contain A2 content
4 as well as A2 question formats, and A2 techniques will be dealt with in the General Conclusion.
5 The first page of each chapter takes the form of a ‘map’ or outline of the chapter. The purpose is to
6 enable the reader to ‘navigate’ through each topic, and to see which aspects of the subject form the focus
7 of each part.
8
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20111 The structure of the chapters
1 Part of the chapter Purpose Method
2
Part 1: Historical background To provide the basic, factual The factual narrative is structured
3
backgrounds and issues related to include all the key themes.
4 to each topic. This may also A chronological summary is also
5 be relevant to some questions provided to give perspective at
6 of the simpler format. a glance.
7
8 Part 2: Essays To provide worked answers to the The wording of the question varies
9 major aspects of each topic. to allow for different types of
30 These provide examples of examination response. Further
1 interpretation and factual support. questions are provided for term-work
2 and examination practice; these can
be prepared through the further reading
3
recommended.
4
5 Part 3: Source analysis To provide a selection of some of Each set of sources has two sets of
6 the key sources for each topic and questions: one with worked examples
7 to examine the different types of and one without. The questions
8 questions which can be asked without worked examples allow for
9 about these. class discussion or for individual
40 practice.
1
2 Part 4: Historical skills To provide some suggestions about The types of skills covered vary from
3 how the topic can be used as a chapter to chapter: they include
focus for selected skills not already discussion and presentation.
4
covered in Parts 2 and 3.
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x • GENERAL INTRODUCTION
Part 1: Historical background

A good understanding of the topic in each chapter is essential before any meaningful analysis can be done.
This involves three main approaches.
The approach of the historical background

Type of approach: Reason for this: How it is accomplished:
1 Outline perspective An ability to visualise the structure Through the chronological summary,
of the topic covered in the chapter the headings and sub-headings, and
and the way in which components the introductory paragraphs of
of the topic fit together. each section.
2 Knowledge in depth An ability to focus on parts of the Through careful and systematic
topic in depth. development of details. These are
grouped within an overall structure.
3 Integrating perspective An ability to combine the overall By relating the details to the
and depth perspective with a focus on interpretations in the essays.
specific selected details.
Understanding of the historical background is also assisted by two sections at the end of the book. First,
significant individuals are discussed in brief Biographies, beginning on p. 308. Second, there is a Glossary of
Key terms, which begins on p. 319. Words and phrases which are explained in the glossary are printed in bold
on the first occasion that they appear in the text. The glossary is in alphabetical order, for ease of reference.
Part 2: Essays
What is an essay?
An essay is a formal attempt to answer a question or to provide a solution to a problem; the term derives
from the French ‘essayer’ and the Latin ‘exigere’, the latter meaning ‘to weigh’. The better the attempt, the
higher the mark will be. There is usually no right or wrong solution. But there can be a solution which is
presented well or badly, or which makes good or poor use of supporting material.
An essay should always be written in full sentences and paragraphs and should not normally include
notes or bullet points. Appropriate lengths vary considerably, but some idea can be gained by the worked
answers in Part 2 of each chapter. Relevance is vital throughout. This means keeping exactly to the confines
of the question asked. The answer should be direct and should start within the first sentence or two.
You should also keep the question in mind throughout the essay, answer all parts of it and include
nothing which is not relevant to it. Think in terms of ‘The question, the whole question and nothing but
the question’.
Instructions in essay questions and what they mean

Instruction Meaning of instruction Examples
Outline . . . Provide a coherent summary of the topic or Ch. 2: 1b; Ch. 3: 2;
Describe . . . issue in the question. It is important to include
What . . .? at least some specific factual references. Ch. 4: 1a, 2a; Ch. 5: 4, 9a;
(‘Outline’, does not mean ‘be vague about’.) Ch. 6: 1; Ch. 9: 1b, 2a, 2b, 4a,
This type of instruction is less common than 5a, 10b; Ch. 10: 1, 5a; Ch. 11: 1
the others and, if it does appear, is more
likely as a short question.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION • xi
1111 Examine . . . The emphasis switches from ‘describing’ to Ch. 3: 9, 11; Ch. 4: 7a; Ch. 5: 1;
2111 Why. . .? ‘providing reasons for’. This means looking Ch. 7: 2b, 7a, 9a; Ch. 8: 4b, 5;
3 at the question as a problem to be solved Ch. 9: 6, 8b, 9b; Ch. 11: 6;
4111 Explain why . . . by a direct answer based on an argument Ch. 2: 1a, 2a; Ch. 3: 1;
5 which selects relevant factual information to Ch. 4: 2b; Ch. 5: 10a; Ch. 6: 6;
support it. Ch. 7: 2a, 7b; Ch. 8: 1a, 1b, 1c,
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2a, 2b, 2c, 4a; Ch. 9: 1a, 10a;
7
Ch. 11: 12
8 Account for . . . Ch. 5: 3a, 9b; Ch. 6: 2, 4, 5;
9 Ch. 11: 2
10111
1 Identify . . . and In addition to the previous instruction, this
2 explain TWO . . . involves choosing two areas to ‘explain’.
3 Make sure that they are relevant to the
4 question and that they can both act as a
5 base for argument. This is common as a
6 second question in a two-part structure.
7
Assess This group of instructions involves more Ch. 4: 1b, 4a, 9a; Ch. 5: 2, 5a;
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directly the notion of ‘weighing’. It is therefore Ch. 7: 6b; Ch. 9: 4b, 7a, 8a;
9
essential to have a clear idea of the ‘extent’ Ch. 10: 6a; Ch. 11: 4, 10
20111 To what extent . . .? to which you ‘agree’ with the proposition put Ch. 2: 1c, 2c, 3b, 4, 5, 7;
1 in the rest of the question. The extremes are Ch. 3: 4; Ch. 4: 6a, 6b, 7b, 8a;
2 ‘entirely’ or ‘not at all’. If you adopt one of Ch. 5: 5b, 10b; Ch. 6: 3; Ch. 7:
3 these, you need to explain why the alternative 3, 4a, 5, 10, 11, 12; Ch. 9: 1c,
4 is not acceptable. More likely are ‘to a very 7b; Ch. 10: 3; Ch. 11: 5, 9, 11
5 How far . . .? limited extent’ or ‘to a large extent, but not Ch. 2: 2b; Ch. 3: 3, 5, 6, 8, 10;
6 entirely.’ In ‘weighing’ two arguments you need Ch. 4: 3a, 3b, 5a, 9a; Ch. 5: 3b,
7 to explain: why one is ‘heavier’ or ‘lighter’ than 7; Ch. 6: 7, 8; Ch. 7: 8; Ch. 9: 3;
8 the other. In terms of style, it is better to Ch. 10: 2, 5b
How far do you avoid using ‘I’ in the answer even if there is a Ch. 2: 8, 10; Ch. 4: 5a
9
agree . . .? ‘you’ in the question.
30
How valid is the view Ch. 4: 5b; Ch. 11: 7
1 that . . .?
2 Discuss . . . Ch. 2: 6, 9; Ch. 3: 7; Ch. 4: 8b;
3 Ch. 5: 8; Ch. 6: 8; Ch. 11: 8
4 How successful/effective Ch. 5: 6; Ch. 7: 1, 4b, 6a;
5 was . . .? Ch. 9: 5b
6 How serious were . . .?
7 How important was . . . ? Ch. 4: 4b; Ch. 9: 9a; Ch. 10:
8 5b, 6b
9 With what justification
... ?
40
Comment on . . .
1
2
Compare . . . The approach will involve the process of
3
Compare and contrast . . . ‘weighing’, as with the previous set of questions.
4 Compare the importance There are, however, two or more specific
45 of three reasons . . . items to ‘weigh’. These may be policies, or they
46 Assess the relative may be arguments about policies. They may be
47 importance of . . . named in the question, or you may be asked
48 How similar were . . .? to select your own. Whatever the case, you
49222 How different were . . .? need to consider the two against each other;
xii • GENERAL INTRODUCTION
at all costs avoid a description of the two

separately. ‘Compare and contrast’ (or ‘compare’
by itself) involves finding similarities and differences
between items, as do ‘how similar were’ and ‘how
different were’.
Argument and support

Since most essays involve an attempt to solve a problem, the solution should be clearly presented and well
supported. The structure should be argument backed up by factual examples. This is much more effective
than factual narrative followed by deduction. For most types of question you should argue then support;
do not narrate then deduce.
Appropriate and inappropriate essay technique

Appropriate essay technique Inappropriate essay technique
Argument Narrative
Factual detail supporting the argument Argument deduced from the narrative
Argument Narrative
Factual detail supporting the argument Argument deduced from the narrative
To become accustomed to writing in this way it can be helpful to outline or highlight argument in red and
factual detail supporting the argument in blue; there will, of course, be some overlapping between the two.
For each issue covered in the essay the red should come before the blue.
Stages in the essay

Stages Appropriate development
Introduction Mostly argument: considering the meaning of the question and offering an
outline answer without detail.
Each subsequent paragraph A part of or stage in the argument. The first sentence of each paragraph is
based on argument. The rest consists of argument supported by factual detail.
It should not normally be factual detail followed by deduction.
Conclusion Need not repeat the arguments already provided, but may pull together any
threads. The final sentence should be a generalisation. Never write
‘unfinished’.
The introductory paragraph is vital since it will usually provide the direction for the rest of the essay; it
will also provide the initial impression for the person reading or marking it. It should be a single para-
graph and of immediate relevance to the question rather than leading gradually to the point. It should be
largely argument, attempting to consider all the key words and concepts in the question and to provide a
brief outline answer to it. This can then be developed in the rest of the essay. All this means that the
introductory paragraph can and should be quite short.
The main section of the essay (about 90 per cent) will consist of several paragraphs that will develop
the issues raised in the introduction. Ideally, each paragraph should start with a stage in the argument, with
the rest of the paragraph comprising a combination of the argument in more detail and relevant factual
support. Paragraphs therefore need to be seen as units within the answer. The reason for starting another
GENERAL INTRODUCTION • xiii
1111 paragraph is usually to move on to another unit. A sequence of very short paragraphs usually shows a
2111 disjointed argument, and a complete absence of paragraphs makes it difficult to follow the stages in the
3 argument at all.
4111 It is important to have some sort of conclusion and not to stop suddenly. This should round the essay
5 off by pulling threads together and giving a final assessment in any ‘to what extent?’ essays. It might also
6 be a fitting place for a quotation, especially one which complements or contradicts any quotation included
7 in the question. Never write ‘unfinished’; in the event of mistiming, use a rounding off sentence rather
8 than a full conclusion.
9
10111
1 Part 3: Source analysis
2
3 Questions are set on primary sources, secondary sources or both. There are different styles of source-based
4 questions. Despite contrasts in wording, however, they do have certain common features.
5
6 Types of source-based questions
7
8 Type of question Examples of question structure General advice on the answer
9
The Source used for • What can you learn from this Identify implications as well as
20111 information and inference. Source about . . .? information. This means inferring,
1 • What evidence is there in Source 1 not describing.
2 to suggest that . . .?
3
4 The Source used as a • Using Source A and your own Identify precisely what is required
5 stimulus for further knowledge. knowledge, explain the meaning of and confine the use of ‘your own
6 Usually this means explaining ‘. . .’ [a phrase in quotation marks]. knowledge’ to explain the words in
7 a particular sentence or • Using your own knowledge, explain the quotation marks. This will, however,
8 phrase in the Source: this briefly, why ‘. . .’ [an event or need accurate detail rather explain
9 will involve further material development in quotation marks]. than vague generalisation.
30 outside the Source.
1
Questions on a Source’s • How useful is Source A about . . . ? For usefulness distinguish between
2
‘usefulness’ and ‘reliability’. • How reliable is Source A about . . .? internal criteria (i.e. content) and
3
• How useful are these Sources external criteria (i.e. the type of Source).
4 to the historian studying . . . ? Reliability can also be assessed by
5 referring to whether the content is
6 accurate and the circumstances in
7 which the source was produced.
8 A source may be unreliable but still
9 useful.
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1 Questions asking for • Compare . . . according to Sources ‘Compare’ or ‘compare and
comparisons between A and B. contrast’ mean finding similarities
2
Sources. These may • How would you explain the and differences. These may involve
3
concern similarities, or differences? details or general arguments.
4 differences, or both. • What evidence in Source 1 supports In either case precise references
45 They may involve an the view in Source 5 that . . . ? are needed, using brief quotations
46 explanation of the reasons • Explain how the judgement in from the sources. Reasons for
47 for similarities or Source A challenges the judgement differences in the content of sources
48 differences. in Source C that . . . usually involve a comment on the
49222 differences in the type of source.
xiv • GENERAL INTRODUCTION
Questions which provide a • Use Sources A to D, and your own The answer needs two dimensions.
viewpoint that needs to be knowledge, to explain whether the • The content and your own
tested against the Sources view that ‘. . .’ is accurate. knowledge of the sources should
and against additional • Study Sources A, B and C and use be ‘used’ to test the viewpoint in
knowledge beyond the your own knowledge. How important the question. At the same time, the
Sources. ... reliability of this content should be
• Refer to Sources A, B and C and briefly assessed: does the source
use your own knowledge. Explain . . . apparently support . . . and does it
• Do you agree that ‘. . .’ Explain your really support . . .?
answer, using the sources and your • ‘Own knowledge’ should have the
own knowledge. same amount of time and space
as the ‘use of sources’ and should
include material beyond the
sources.
How does this book combine the different approaches of the

boards to essays and source questions?
The use by the boards of different styles is an opportunity to see common objectives from slightly different
angles. It is very likely that an approach used by a board you are not following will clarify at least one
approach used by the board that you are. At the very least, you will learn a great deal about what essay and
source skills mean by comparing the ways in which they are approached. This is because you will be doing
the most important thing you can do: you will be thinking about what the skills actually mean.
This book attempts to use all the approaches of the boards in a way in which they relate to each other
and reinforce each other. At the same time, it intends to give precise examples of how the questions of
specific boards can best be approached. A subject area which is not represented in a board’s specifications
may not contain essays or Source questions in that board’s question style.
AS question styles of the boards and where they are located in this book
Board Styles of answers Where located in chapters
OCR Essays (one-part) Chs 2, 6, 8

(two-part) 30/60 minutes Chs 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10
Sources (3 questions) Chs 4, 5, 7
AQA Essays (one-part) AS (20) Chs 3, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11

Essays (three-part) Chs 8, 9
Sources (3 questions) Chs 2, 8, 9, 10
Edexcel Essays (two-part) Chs 7, 9, 10

Essay/source combination Ch. 9
(3 questions)
GENERAL INTRODUCTION • xv
1111
2111 Part 4: Historical Skills
3
4111 History is a diverse subject with wide-ranging skills. There is also much more emphasis on academic skills
5 within the context of the sixth form. The two can be closely connected and the purpose of Part 4 of each
6 chapter is to suggest how specific skills can be developed both within the History course and with a close
7 connection to more general sixth-form courses. The intention is to enhance techniques already developed
8 in essay-writing and source-analysis – but also to go beyond them in anticipating the needs of students of
9 higher education. The focus of Part 4 of the various chapters is summarised below. These overlap – but
10111 are not intended to duplicate – the various patterns of key skills.
1 Each chapter considers the development of a different skill. The historical context may not be directly
2 relevant to what you are studying, but the skill will be transferable to the area that is. This has the added
3 benefit of making you think about the process of transferring ideas from one context to another and, in
4 the process, changing and refining them. This, as much as anything else, is what History is about.
5
6 Skills covered in this book
7
8 Type of skill What it is that is covered Where it is covered
9
1 Essay-writing • Purpose of essays. Introduction: Part 2; and
20111
• Preparation and structure; analysis and factual Chs 2–11: Part 2.
1
support. Ch. 5: Part 4.
2 • Precise coverage of the requirements of different
3 styles of question.
4 • Thematic approach to answer.
5
2 Source-analysis • Types of sources and techniques of analysis. Introduction: Part 3; and
6
• Different types of question. Chs 2–11: Part 3.
7
• Contextual knowledge.
8
• Comparison between sources.
9 • Usefulness and reliability of sources. Chs 4, 6, 7 and 11: Part 4.
30 • Use of sources and own knowledge in an overall
1 assessment.
2
3 3 Writing different • Producing a report. Ch. 6: Part 4.
types of document
4
5 4 Oral contributions • Contributing to a discussion or debate. Chs 2 and 8: Part 4.
6 5 Numerical skills • Use of bar charts. Chs 4 and 6: Part 4.
7 • Use of tables. Ch. 6: Part 3.
8 • Use of graphs. Ch. 11: Part 4.
9
6 Weighting the • Assessing the roles or significance of individuals. Chs 3, 8 and 11: Part 4.
40
importance of • Weighing up the relative importance of factors
1
different factors as causes.
2
or individuals
3
4 7 Working with others • Group work involving decision-making. Ch. 2: Part 4.
45 towards an agreed
46 objective
47 8 Research skills • Use of websites. Chs 3, 5, 6, 9, 10 and 11:
48 • Synthesis of information. Part 4.
49222 • Textbook reading.
xvi • GENERAL INTRODUCTION
9 Empathy • To understand differing perspectives on issues. Chs 3, 9 and 10, Part 4.
10 Anticipating the • Historiography and the study of different Conclusion: Part 2.

skills required for A2 interpretations.
• Synoptic approaches to a period of about 100 years.
• How the study of AS History leads conceptually to
A2 History.
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 1
5
6
7
8
9
10111
An Introduction to the Period
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111 Independence
1
2 In the mid-eighteenth century the inhabitants of the thirteen colonies along the Atlantic seaboard of America
3 still regarded themselves as British, but the society in which they lived was far from similar to that in Britain,
4 and in fact major differences had emerged between northern and southern colonies, with such issues as
5 slavery having a profound effect upon the diversity of life in the Americas. The end, in 1763, of the French
6 and Indian War (or Seven Years War, depending on one’s perspective), changed the relationship between
7 the colonies and the mother country, but rather than putting relations on a firmer footing it hastened the
8 process by which the colonies became independent.
9 The British had no plans to destroy liberty in North America and until the winter of 1775/6 very few
30 colonists favoured independence; yet between 1775 and 1781 the Americans, with the help of the French,
1 defeated the greatest military power in the world at that time and achieved their independence. In the years
2 that followed independence there was initially little support for the expansion of central power and the
3 writing of a new constitution. The ‘Founding Fathers’ however, who met in Philadelphia in the summer
4 of 1787, changed all of that and by the end of 1789 the Constitution had been ratified, and George
5 Washington had been elected the first President of the US. The new Constitution and accompanying Bill
6 of Rights ensured that the American Revolution would be a strictly political event, with the social order
7 remaining firmly intact. It contained compromises on major issues such as slavery, the representation of
8 the large and small states, the extent of federal power, and trade; but they were not all compromises which
9 could be laid to rest, and in the years to come the struggle for the Constitution would almost destroy the
40 Union it had created.
1
2
3 Expansion, war and Reconstruction
4
45 The first half of the nineteenth century was dominated by westwards expansion, with two large tracts of
46 land accruing to the US as a result of the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 and the buying of land from Mexico
47 following the peace treaty of 1848. As territories further west applied to join the Union as states, the ques-
48 tion of whether they would be ‘slave’ or ‘free’ states became a thorny issue, particularly as abolitionists,
49222 who opposed slavery on moral grounds, grew more vocal. Until the 1850s, when the Whig Party collapsed
2 • AN INTRODUCTION TO THE PERIOD
and the Republican Party came into existence, the party system that had evolved from the end of the eight-
eenth century managed to prevent slavery from becoming the sectional issue it had always threatened to
become. Anti-Catholicism moved from centre stage and gave way to the issue of slavery, which became
linked to that of states’ rights versus federal rights, and also to wider questions on the nature of individual
freedom, culminating in eleven Southern slave states leaving the Union in the months following Abraham
Lincoln’s election in 1860.
In the decades before the American Civil War (1861–5) the beginnings of industrial development had
been more noticeable in the North and it was this greater capacity for production of the materials of war
that allowed the North to make more guns and boats than the South. The larger population of the North
also allowed it to recruit more soldiers, and these advantages ultimately proved to be crucial to the outcome
of the war.
The war was to prove a watershed in terms of resolving some of the issues over which the Constitution
had attempted compromise. Slavery was abolished, and the supremacy of federal rights over states’ rights
was secured, along with the future dominance of the North and the Republican Party. Not all Americans
however would be reconciled to the verdict the war had brought, and the period of Reconstruction following
war witnessed prolonged bitterness on the part of Southern whites, as well as the first impeachment of a
President, and culminated in a ‘corrupt bargain’ in 1877 between Democrats and Republicans, largely at
the expense of African Americans.
The rise to power – ‘boom and bust’

In the years between 1865 and the close of the century the US became the most powerful industrial nation
in the world. The closing of the frontier in 1890 seemed to reinforce the dominance of industrialisation
and urbanisation. The pejoratively termed ‘Gilded Age’ had been largely powered by massive immigra-
tion, and had brought with it great wealth for the few, social problems on a scale never seen before, and
political corruption at the highest level. A kind of backlash came with the Progressives, who prompted
greater state intervention to curb the worst excesses of the capitalist system and championed social and
political reform.
The 1890s also saw early attempts at empire-building, with intervention in the Civil War in Spanish
Cuba by which the US gained certain Caribbean colonies and power in the Pacific. The reluctance of the
government to become involved in the First World War was finally overcome and the US emerged from
isolation to play a crucial part in the outcome. America reaped the rewards of victory and was also soon
to experience the industrial boom of the 1920s – a decade which also brought with it intolerance, repres-
sion, Prohibition and female suffrage. The prosperity of the 1920s however was not widely enough dispersed
and this was partly what led to the Great Depression that haunted 1930s America. Franklin Roosevelt’s
‘New Deal’ was only partially successful, but demonstrated the extent to which federal government could
intervene to improve quality of life and set a precedent for the post-war era. The prosperity of the country
was ironically restored by a war that it had, once again, hoped to avoid, with the US eventually being shaken
out of its isolationist complacency by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
The Cold War and beyond

With the advent of the Cold War, foreign policy took an anti-communist direction, against the backdrop
of McCarthyism during the 1950s. The decade also brought major civil rights agitation particularly on the
part of African Americans. In the 1960s, Kennedy and Johnson expanded government intervention but
their domestic legislation was overshadowed by involvement in Vietnam. Watergate in turn overshadowed
the cessation of hostilities with Vietnam, as well as the Nixon Presidency, and seriously undermined the
AN INTRODUCTION TO THE PERIOD • 3
1111 faith of the American people in the way the country was governed. The years of Ford and Carter were
2111 followed by the emergence of the ‘New Right’, personified by Ronald Reagan. In 1992, in the aftermath of
3 the LA riots that left 55 dead, Bill Clinton was elected President. He was a ‘New Democrat’ who claimed
4111 the era of ‘big government had ended’, but will be best remembered for being only the second President
5 in US history to be impeached. Like Andrew Johnson before him, he may have survived the trial but the
6 whole affair left a sour taste in the mouths of voters.
7 At the beginning of the twenty-first century the US could still be described as an ‘unfinished nation’,
8 to borrow the title of Alan Brinkley’s excellent book. The US had emerged from the Cold War as the world’s
9 only superpower but the richest 1 per cent of its population held 38 per cent of its wealth, and there were
10111 also signs that some of the lessons of the past had not been learned: a movement seeking reparations for
1 the families of former black slaves strove to make its case; the number of black males in prison exceeded
2 the number in higher education; and tens of thousands of neo-confederates continued to call for independ-
3 ence from the control of a federal government which had apparently ceased to represent Southern values;
4 while the election of George W. Bush in 2000 and the repercussions of ‘9/11’ appear to have ushered in a
5 new era for the United States and the wider world.
6
7 The fundamental aims of this textbook are to deal with the issues covered by the examination boards in a
8 concise but interesting way. In many ways the Presidency, the wider federal government and the
9 Constitution is all that Americans have in common, which is why history has often been written from the
20111 top down. We hope that in the following pages we have managed to do more than this, and have succeeded
1 in raising issues that may provide students with the impetus to find out more about the fascinating history
2 of the United States of America.
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49222
Chapter 2
The Struggle for the Constitution,

1763–1877
This chapter will cover the build-up to the War of Independence and the subsequent writing
of the US Constitution. The problems that the Constitution failed to resolve will be exam-
ined, along with the changing nature of American society and politics. An assessment of
the impact of the Constitution and its amendments on the political development of the
US, the significance of the Civil War for the country, and the changing role of the Presidency
will also be undertaken.
Historical background Sources
Introduction 1 The struggle to ratify the Constitution

The road to independence 2 The debate over the power of federal
The winning of independence and subsequent government
problems
Revising the Articles of Confederation
The emergence of party rivalries Historical skills
Politics and constitutional disputes
Amendments to the Constitution 1 Write your own constitution
Judicial power 2 A debate on the Constitution of 1787
Presidential powers
The constitutional impact of the Civil War and its
aftermath
Essays
The writing of the Constitution

The Constitution in practice
The significance of the Civil War
THE STRUGGLE FOR THE CONSTITUTION, 1763–1877 • 5
1111
2111 Chronology
3
4111 1754 French and Indian War began
5 1756 Seven Years War began
6 1763 Peace of Paris ended ‘Seven Years War’ between Britain and France
7 1764 Sugar Act
8 1765 Stamp Tax levied on colonists by British government
9 Stamp Act Congress met at New York with nine colonies represented
10111 1766 Stamp Act repealed by British but Declaratory Act confirmed subordinate
1 status of colonies
2 1770 Boston Massacre – five colonists killed
3 1773 Boston Tea Party
4 1774 First Continental Congress met at Philadelphia with 12 colonies represented
5 1775 First shots fired at Lexington in War of Independence
6 Second Continental Congress met at Philadelphia
7 1776 Declaration of Independence
8 1777 Articles of Confederation agreed by most states
9 1783 Treaty of Paris – Britain formally recognised US independence
20111 1786 Shays’ Rebellion against taxes in Massachusetts
1 1787 Philadelphia Convention met and wrote the new Constitution
2 1789 George Washington chosen to be first President and First Congress elected
3 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts passed (impinged on free speech)
4 1798–9 Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions advocated nullification of federal laws
5 by states
6 1800 Thomas Jefferson elected President
7 1802 Louisiana Purchase doubled size of US territory
8 1803 Supreme Court established right of judicial review to overturn an Act of
9 Congress
30 1812 War of 1812 started against the British
1 1819 Florida acquired from Spain
2 1828 Andrew Jackson elected President
3 1845 Texas admitted to Union
4 1846 Oregon territory acquired
5 1846–7 War with Mexico
6 1848 Mexican land purchased
7 1860 Abraham Lincoln, first Republican to be elected President
8 1861 American Civil War began
9 1862 Homestead Act passed by Congress
40 1863 Emancipation Proclamation
1 1865 End of Civil War
2 Lincoln assassinated
3 13th Amendment (abolished slavery)
4 1867 Andrew Johnson impeached but not found guilty
45 1868 Ulysses S. Grant elected President
46 1870 15th Amendment stated that right to vote could not be denied on grounds
47 of race
48 1877 Compromise between supporters of Presidential candidates Hayes and Tilden
49222
6 • THE STRUGGLE FOR THE CONSTITUTION, 1763–1877
Introduction
By the middle of the eighteenth century there existed 13 colonies on the Atlantic seaboard of the North
American continent all nominally under British rule. They had been established for a range of reasons in
the seventeenth century, except for Georgia which was created in 1733 as a colony for deported debtors.
Trade and profit had been the motivation for the setting up of New York, New Jersey and South Carolina,
for example, while many of those who set up home in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Pennsylvania did
so in order to practise their religious beliefs freely. The colonies each had different customs, currencies and
laws, as well as varying climates, which all contributed to economic differences – including the use of African
slaves in the southern colonies – and the possibility that one day they might unite to break the shackles of
their mother country seemed highly unlikely.
The Treaty of Paris in 1763 has been a convenient event for historians who wish to study the birth of
an independent United States of America, given that it formalised the end of the Seven Years War, but
there were signs before 1763 that relations between the British and their American cousins were not exactly
cordial. In the summer of 1754 a force of the Virginia militia was despatched under the command of a
young colonel called George Washington to limit French expansion into the Ohio Valley. Washington’s
surrender of Fort Necessity marked the beginning of what colonists called the French and Indian War
though it was not until 1756 that the British became formally involved in military action against the French
and their Indian allies. Many Americans had hoped the British might get involved sooner, but when they
did finally appear, great offence was caused to the very colonists they were supposed to be protecting.
The requisition of supplies, impressment of troops and reimposition of Crown authority caused a great
deal of friction, and Prime Minister Pitt acted swiftly: reimbursing colonists for supplies; allowing the
colonial assemblies to take control of recruitment; and sending greater numbers of soldiers from Britain.
There is no doubt that the cessation of the struggle between France and Great Britain for global domin-
ance marked a turning point, and in the aftermath of the war, relations between the 13 colonies and their
mother country began to decline markedly. For the British, the defeat of the French was expected to give
the Crown greater power in America; whereas for the American colonists, the French defeat seemed to
reduce their dependence on Britain for protection.
The road to independence
By the terms of the Treaty of Paris, the French ceded all of Canada and the land east of the Mississippi to
the British, who established the Proclamation Line near the crest of the Allegheny Mountains and declared
all land to the west to be Indian territory. This was partly in response to the uprising led by Pontiac, chief
of the Ottawa, against frontiersmen who had crossed into tribal lands, but served merely to annoy the
independent-minded colonists who sought to move west. In addition the exertions of war had more
than doubled the national debt of Britain and it was felt that the American colonists should contribute
more towards paying off the debt for a war from which they had clearly benefited, as well as to the upkeep
of a standing army to guard the frontier. Increasing tax demands, trade controls to reduce manufactures
that competed with British goods, clamping down on smuggling, and maintaining a standing army that
might even be used against them, all served to further aggravate anti-British feeling among the colonists.
The most notorious of the measures designed to increase revenue from the under-taxed Americans
was the Stamp Act of 1765, which levied a tax on all printed documents and thereby offended a range of
influential colonials. It led to the calling of the Stamp Act Congress in New York to which nine colonies
sent representatives who agreed that they should only be taxed if their own assemblies approved. This was
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND • 7
1111 Figure 2.1 Map illustrating how the United States was formed
2111
3
4111
WASH
5 1889
6 MONT
NH 1788
OREG
7 1859
1889
MAINE
N.DAK 1889 VT 1791
8 IDAHO 1820
1890
9 WYO S.DAK
MINN WIS
1890 1889 1848 NY MASS 1788
10111 1858
MICH 1788
NEV
1 1864 NEBR IOWA 1837
PA
RI 1790
UTAH 1846
2 1896
1867
ILL OHIO
IND
1787 CONN 1788
CALIF COLO 1803
3 1850 KANS
1818 1816 NJ 1787
1876 W.VA
4 1861 MO 1863
VA DEL 1787
ARIZ 1821 1788
5 KY 1792 MD 1788
1812 NC
OKLA
6 1907 ARK
TENN 1796 1789
N. MEX SC
7 1836
GADSDEN 1912 MASS ALA GA 1788
8 PURCHASE 1853 LA 1817 1819 1788
9 TEXAS 1812
1845
20111
1 FLA
0 400 km 1845
2 ALASKA CEDED BY
1959 SPAIN 1819
3
HAWAII
4 1959
5 AMERICAN GUAM PUERTO VIRGIN
6 PURCHASED FROM ANNEXED SAMOA RICO ISLANDS
RUSSIA 1867 IN 1898
7
8 0 500 km 0 500 km ACQUIRED ACQUIRED ACQUIRED PURCHASED
9 1899 1898 1898 1917
30 KEY:
1 Oregon territory Ceded by Mexico Louisiana purchase
2 title established in 1846 1848 1803
3 Texas annexed Territory of the
4 1845 original thirteen states
5
6
7 significant in that it was the first formal attempt the colonists had made to organise themselves. The Stamp
8 Act was repealed by the British, but soon the colonists were paying perhaps ten times as much as they had
9 done before 1763. Despite the revision of the Proclamation Line in 1768 to open areas for colonisation,
40 Americans were not satisfied. Even worse, the 1774 Quebec Act seemed designed to cause offence, for as
1 well as recognising Roman Catholics, leaving French civil law in force, giving authority to a governor of
2 Quebec without an elected assembly, and limiting trial by jury, it re-expanded the boundaries of the
3 Canadian province as far south as the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, which was regarded as damaging to the
4 western ambitions of Virginia and Pennsylvania.
45 The colonies had faced their fair share of internal unrest in the past. In 1763 the Paxton Boys had
46 marched on Philadelphia to demand tax relief and financial support, while in 1771 a small-scale civil war
47 had erupted in North Carolina, but the actions of the mother country gradually brought the squabbling
48 colonists together. The British refused to give way, and relations gradually deteriorated with such events
49222 as the Boston Massacre and the Boston Tea Party, followed by the Intolerable Acts which further increased
tensions. Americans called the First Continental Congress at Philadelphia in September 1774, petitioned
King George III for a return to their 1763 status, demanded no taxation without representation and
boycotted British goods. In April 1775 the first military skirmishes of the War of Independence took place
at Lexington and Concord, persuading undecided colonists to join the radicals. Englishman Thomas Paine’s
pamphlet ‘Common Sense’ – considered widely to have been a great inspiration to revolutionaries – went
through an astonishing 25 editions in 1776, selling hundreds of thousands of copies. Although it actually
worried revolutionaries such as John Adams of Massachusetts in case it encouraged too much democratic
thought.
On 2 July 1776 Congress approved Virginian Richard Henry Lee’s resolution that ‘these United
Colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states’. This vote formally marked the birth
of the United States, but it is 4 July that is remembered for the Declaration of Independence (only a full
declaration of independence would have won over French support), which was mainly the work of another
Virginian, Thomas Jefferson. It proclaimed the existence of 13 free and independent states and drew on
English philosopher John Locke’s belief that a government could be overthrown when it ceased to preserve
the lives, liberty and happiness of its people. However, of those who signed the document, 69 per cent had
held colonial office under the Crown. And in Boston, within a week of the Declaration, it was decided that
the rich could avoid the military draft by paying for substitutes, whereas the poor had no choice (a similar
system would operate years later during the Civil War). It was therefore clear from an early stage that there
would be no great social changes to match the political ones.
Some historians see the origins of the War of Independence in political, intellectual and constitutional
terms, while others tend to emphasise social and economic causes, arguing that the colonists had more
material interests at heart, but it is possible to see a combination of both interacting.
The winning of independence and subsequent problems
It is argued that between one-fifth and one-third of white colonists remained loyal to Britain during the
Revolution and up to 100,000 colonists left the country in its aftermath. Indians generally recognised that
their best interests lay with a British victory and chose sides accordingly, as did some blacks. The eventual
triumph of the ‘American patriots’ hastened westwards expansion at the expense of Native Americans.
It also, according to radical historian Howard Zinn, allowed revolutionary leaders to enrich themselves by
taking over confiscated loyalist land and distributing some of it to small farmers in order to create a broad
base of support for the new regime (p. 83), leaving poorer whites in much the same situation as before
the war.
With the fall of Yorktown to the Americans in 1781 the war was effectively over for the British, although
given that the states had taken until 1781 to finally adopt the Articles of Confederation, in many ways it
is a wonder that they did win. The Articles, largely the work of John Dickinson, and regarded by many as
the United States’ first Constitution, bound the states together in a fairly loose alliance, creating a legis-
lative body but not an executive one, nor an independent court system. At least 9 of the 13 states (i.e.
two-thirds) had to agree for an important measure to be implemented, while all 13 had to agree for any
amendment to be made to the Articles. The unicameral Congress, in which each state had one vote regard-
less of population, continued to have problems raising taxes, regulating trade, raising troops and making
decisions to which all states would agree.
By the terms of the Treaty of Paris in 1783, Britain granted the US independence covering land
from the southern border of Canada to the northern border of Florida, and as far west as the Mississippi.
This quickly became a source of dispute between several of the states. Many Americans assumed
that after the war the states would essentially continue to govern themselves, and that there would be no
need to further centralise power. After all, had they not just fought a war against an over-mighty govern-
ment. In 1783 all states had their own constitutions, designed to limit the power of executive branches,
1111 with legislatures usually elected annually, but by the end of the 1780s many state constitutions had been
2111 revised to create greater stability, often by reducing levels of popular participation.
3 In 1783 Congress actually moved itself to Princeton, New Jersey – to avoid the threats of army veterans
4111 eager for pay they were still owed – then to Annapolis, Maryland, before settling in New York in 1785.
5 Delegates did not always attend regularly, which also undermined the Congress’s position, and by 1786 it
6 had become apparent to many that the states faced significant problems which only a revision of the Articles
7 of Confederation could remedy. The difficulties in convincing Britain and Spain to actually adhere to the
8 terms of the Treaty of Paris (the British held on to forts in the north-west and Spain closed off the Mississippi
9 to American trade) also highlighted the diplomatic weakness of the states under the Articles, although a
10111 system was devised for organising land to the west. The post-war depression, which lasted from 1784 to
1 1787, exacerbated the problems of ensuring an adequate supply of money, and without the power to impose
2 taxes, the Confederation could not pay off its debts. Financial issues were further complicated by different
3 states dealing in different currencies.
4 Connecticut quarrelled with its neighbours over trade, Maryland and Virginia disputed ownership of
5 the Potomac river, and Pennsylvania and Connecticut disputed the Wyoming valley, and Rhode Island
6 infuriated other states by issuing a paper currency of its own. Perhaps the most alarming incident of post-
7 war society came in 1786 with the revolt led by Daniel Shays, which aimed to put pressure on the
8 Massachusetts state legislature to cancel debts. There was wide support, particularly from small farmers
9 who owed money, and the revolt spread beyond Massachusetts, eventually being put down by a force of
20111 state militia financed by a group of wealthy merchants. The debtors Shays led even helped George
1 Washington, a Virginia plantation owner, to overcome his doubts regarding the wisdom of a constitutional
2 convention. Shays’ Rebellion is often treated in isolation from previous acts of insurrection, but it is worth
3 noting that the trend started with Bacon’s rebellion in Virginia in 1676. By 1760 there had been 18 separ-
4 ate uprisings aimed at overthrowing colonial governments, as well as 6 black rebellions, and 40 serious riots
5 (Zinn 1996: p. 59). Zinn contends that this rebellious energy had been channelled by the elites against the
6 British during the war, but with the British gone the elites began to worry. The historian Charles Beard
7 argued that other than minimising and repressing physical violence, the main purpose of any government
8 is to make rules that decide property relations between members of society. There certainly seems to have
9 been no popular clamour for a new constitution. M.J. Heale (1986) has even suggested that there was no
30 overwhelming economic or military reason to abandon the Articles of Confederation and pointed out a
1 number of successes of the Articles, arguing the states were far from disintegrating, as New York’s Alexander
2 Hamilton, for example, would have had people believe (Heale 1986: p. 42).
3
4
5 Revising the Articles of Confederation
6
7 The Philadelphia Convention that met in May 1787 had officially been assembled to revise the Articles, but
8 the representatives from Virginia, led by James Madison and Edmund Randolph, put forward proposals
9 for a completely new constitution. The only state not represented at Philadelphia was Rhode Island, the
40 legislature of which was so divided that members could not agree upon whom to send as delegates. The
1 motives and intentions of the Founding Fathers were mixed and have been the source of much debate
2 among historians ever since. Alan Brinkley (2000) has asserted that Madison and his contemporaries
3 believed that sovereignty lay with the people, but the Constitution drawn up did not acknowledge women,
4 blacks or Native Americans as the equals of white males. Edward Countryman believes the Founding Fathers
45 ‘sincerely believed in the dual enlightenment principles of representation and consent of the governed’
46 (1999: p. 25), but they drew their ideas from British tradition and law as well as from such enlightened
47 thinkers as Montesquieu and Locke.
48 Many have concentrated on the social make-up of the Convention and suggested that the members of
49222 it designed a constitution to suit themselves. Heale has talked of the elite’s desire for a ‘unified republic
Figure 2.2
George Washington at the
Constitutional Convention
in Philadelphia, 1787
which would span a continent . . . and command the respect of the world’ and said that as ‘men of high
status they were cool towards the popular and democratic tendencies in state and local government’, arguing
that ‘their actions can be construed as counter-revolutionary’ (p. 43). He concludes that ‘the Constitution
was designed to reconcile hierarchy with democracy’ and the fact that it was decided the President and
Senate should be chosen by electoral colleges rather than by direct popular vote suggests he is correct.
The average age of the Founding Fathers was about 40 and the majority of the original 55 were lawyers.
Most were rich, owning land, slaves and businesses, while half were also moneylenders, and 40 held govern-
ment bonds. The concept of a strong federal government must have had its appeal. After all it would be
able to set high tariffs, prevent the use of paper money to pay off debts, open up Indian lands to specula-
tion, safeguard slavery and raise taxes to pay off bonds. Whatever their precise motives, at Philadelphia
the Founding Fathers created a model for government based on a separation of powers between the three
main branches of government and ensured that individuals could not serve in more than one branch simul-
taneously. They combined this with a series of checks and balances which included: a federal system (to
protect the country from the tyranny of an over-mighty central government as well as the tyranny of the
people); a bicameral Congress whose laws could be vetoed by a President, who in turn could be overruled
by a two-thirds Congressional majority, and even impeached for serious offences; a mechanism for changing
the Constitution, but which prevented whimsical changes being made to it; as well as various other devices
such as making the President’s cabinet and Supreme Court appointees subject to Senate approval, and
stipulating that the President and members of both Houses of Congress would each serve for a different
number of years. It was not immediately apparent that the Supreme Court would come to rule on the
constitutionality of laws passed by Congress, but in practice this is what came to happen.
Despite what the Founding Fathers may have had in common as a social elite, the Constitution finally
agreed upon was based on significant compromises. Agreement was eventually reached over: how large
and small states would be represented in a bicameral Congress; the three-fifths compromise for the counting
of slaves in each state’s representation in elections; the regulation of trade by Congress and the safeguard-
ing of slavery; the eventual termination of the slave trade; and the thorny issue of the power relationship
between central and state government. For the time the compromises seemed to have resolved major
stumbling blocks in the creation of the new government, but they were to be compromises which contained
the seeds of future rivalries between North and South.
1111 Once the Constitution had been written the agreement of sufficient number of states was required to
2111 make it work. Cleverly and confusingly the supporters of the Constitution called themselves the Federalists,
3 although in many respects their opponents who emphasised states’ rights would have fitted the description
4111 better. The so-called Anti-Federalists doubted the very legality of what the Founding Fathers had done,
5 never mind what the Constitution actually contained. The Federalists got their act together faster and more
6 effectively than their opponents, and men such as Alexander Hamilton talked of a permanent body being
7 necessary to ‘check the imprudence of democracy’; while Madison, in The Federalist (a political pamphlet
8 promoting the merits of the Constitution), argued for strong government to keep down the factional
9 disputes which arose from ‘various and unequal distribution of property’.
10111 The conventions that ratified the Constitution were elected by about 20 per cent of white men, hardly
1 popular sovereignty in action. Colin Bonwick (1991) has also highlighted some rather dubious tactics
2 pursued by the Federalists. They insisted that all states elected conventions to ratify the Constitution (state
3 legislatures would probably have rejected it), which would take time and hence allow them, the Federalists,
4 to put out more propaganda; and two Anti-Federalist delegates were forcibly held in their places to make
5 a quorum to ensure the Pennsylvania legislature called a convention (Bonwick 1991: p. 226). The promise
6 of a bill of rights (which would add ten amendments, essentially protecting various freedoms, guaranteeing
7 certain legal rights and establishing the power relationship between centre and states) was enough to swing
8 the vote in Massachusetts, although, according to Leonard Richards, delegates at the Massachusetts Conven-
9 tion were possibly bribed to vote for ratification of the Constitution. Jackson Turner Main has even
20111 suggested that the Anti-Federalists were in a slight majority in the country as a whole.
1 Zinn concludes that the Constitution was the work of an elite aiming to protect and preserve its own
2 privileges, while conceding just enough in the way of rights and freedoms to just enough people to achieve
3 popular backing (1996: p. 97).
4
5 The emergence of party rivalries
6
7 It has been suggested that in many ways the First Congress, which assembled in 1789, can be seen as a
8 continuation of the Philadelphia Convention as there were so many gaps in the Constitution which still
9 had to be filled. Decisions on the number of Supreme Court judges, how the lower courts would be organ-
30 ised, and the creation of government departments, all had to be made, and a bill of rights (the first ten
1 amendments) also had to be drafted. It is significant that the 10th Amendment, concerning the relation-
2 ship between the central and state governments, was approved without the addition of the word ‘expressly’
3 before the word ‘delegated’ regarding the powers of the US (which would otherwise have severely restricted
4 the federal government’s scope for action), causing much debate in the years to come. The debate over the
5 nature of the Constitution was to continue once it was in place, and the party system which emerged and
6 became another element of the ‘checks and balances’, was essentially as a result of differences over the inter-
7 pretation of the power of the federal government.
8 The Federalists were effectively under Hamilton’s leadership as Washington tried to take a non-partisan
9 stance, and were strongest in the commercial parts of the north-east as well as coastal Virginia and South
40 Carolina. They believed in strong national government and a diverse commercial economy. From 1792
1 Anti-Federalists became Democratic-Republicans and were strongest in New York, inland areas of Virginia
2 and rural parts of the South and West, and although Washington was again unopposed in the election of
3 1792, the Republicans ran Clinton as their Vice-Presidential candidate against Adams. They followed the
4 views of Jefferson who envisaged small independent farmers living in a country with minimal government
45 interference. As Secretary of the Treasury, Hamilton set up a Bank of the United States in 1791. Secretary
46 of State Jefferson and Attorney-General Randolph took the view that the government did not have the
47 power to charter one, but Washington favoured Hamilton’s argument that the Constitution should be
48 ‘broadly construed’ rather than strictly, drawing on the implied powers of the 10th Amendment. The
49222 government passed a tariff, agreed to pay a small group of bondholders, and raised taxes accordingly.
It was one such tax, the ‘Whiskey Tax’, that provoked small farmers in western Pennsylvania who made
whiskey, because it was easier to transport and sell than grain, to take up arms in 1794. Hamilton led troops
to put them down, but the heavy-handed treatment of the Whiskey Rebellion by Washington, who had
raised a force of nearly 15,000 men, was greeted with grave misgivings by Jeffersonians. Divisions between
the parties would continue over the Constitution and government power, Hamilton’s financial policies,
and foreign relations, particularly the pro-British stance taken by the government during the Napoleonic
Wars. In Bonwick’s view, by 1800 the party system appeared to have proved its worth, and with its
development and vindication, completed the Revolution (1991: p. 251).
Politics and constitutional disputes
John Adams pipped Jefferson to the Presidency in 1796 by only three electoral college votes, and the latter
had to be satisfied with the Vice-Presidency. It was not until the 12th Amendment of 1804 that electors
could cast separate votes for President and Vice-President and even this was to cause problems. In 1800
the plan that one Republican elector would cast one of his two votes for a Presidential candidate other than
Aaron Burr, to ensure that Jefferson won, went wrong, and the two men tied on 73 votes each which meant
that the House of Representatives, in which the Federalists held a majority, had to decide the outcome.
After the 36th ballot Jefferson was elected, but he never forgave Burr.
Despite the 1st Amendment of the Constitution apparently safeguarding free speech, in 1798 the
Sedition Act made it a crime to say or write anything ‘false, scandalous and malicious’ against the govern-
ment with the intent to defame, or stir up popular hatreds against them. It was passed at the time of the
French-supported Irish rebellion and the Supreme Court upheld it. The Alien Act of 1798 aimed to reduce
immigration and even encourage some of those recently arrived to leave, though Adams did not actually
deport any aliens. The Sedition Act was used in the arrest and conviction of ten men, most of them
Republican newspaper editors who had dared to criticise some aspect of government policy, but Adams
restrained Federalists from persecuting their opponents. It is significant that during 1798–9 Jefferson and
Madison each wrote a set of resolutions (anonymously) for Kentucky and Virginia respectively which drew
upon the ideas of John Locke and the 10th Amendment to argue that individual states had the right to
nullify any law if they felt that the central government had exceeded its powers in creating it. The proposals
did not win widespread appeal, but thirty years later John C. Calhoun was to advance a similar argument
in defence of South Carolina’s response to high tariffs.
There is a tendency to associate the states’ rights issue with the
Figure 2.3 Thomas Jefferson Southern states in the build-up to Civil War, but it was a group
of Federalists in Massachusetts (the Essex Junto) who talked of
secession from the Union and forming a Northern confederacy
in the early 1800s, fearing that as the country expanded westwards
Federalist and New England influence would wane. They accord-
ingly persuaded Aaron Burr to stand for governor of New York in
1804, possibly with his support for the state seceding. Hamilton
and Burr exchanged insults, which culminated in Hamilton’s death
in a duel fought between the two and Burr’s flight to avoid a
murder charge. The War of 1812 against the British brought
further calls from New England Federalists for a right of nullifica-
tion and demands for amendments to the Constitution to protect
north-eastern interests from the South and West, but by the time
of the Treaty of Ghent in 1814 party hostilities had died down.
The so-called ‘Era of Good Feelings’ was about to begin with
Monroe trying to bring unity to politics by appointing a mixture
1111 Figure 2.4

The Missouri Compromise, 1820
2111 Map illustrating
Free states and territories Closed to slavery by the Missouri Compromise Line (36°30')
3 the Missouri in 1820 Missouri Compromise Except for Missouri, new territories and
4111 Compromise, Slave states and territories
states closed to slavery north of this line
in 1820
5 1820
6
7
OREGON CANADA
8 COUNTRY (British)
(Occupied by Britain and
9 the United States)
VERMONT
(1791)
MAINE
(1820)
10111 UNORGANIZED TERRITORY MICHIGAN
TERRITORY
NEW
HAMPSHIRE
1 NEW YORK
MASSACHUSETTS
2 RHODE ISLAND
CONNECTICUT
PENNSYLVANIA
3 MEXICO
ILLINOIS INDIANA
(1816)
OHIO
(1803)
NEW JERSEY
(1818) DELAWARE
4 (Spanish)
MISSOURI
KENTUCKY
VIRGINIA MARYLAND
(1821)
5 P A C I F I C
36°30' (1792)
TENNESSEE NORTH
CAROLINA
6 O C E A N
ARKANSAS TERRITORY (1796)
SOUTH
CAROLINA
7 MISSIS-
SIPPI ALABAMA
GEORGIA
8 (1817) (1819)
A T L A N T I C
9 O C E A N
20111 LOUISIANA (1812) FLORIDA

TERRITORY
0 400 miles G u l f o f
1 0 500 kilometres M e x i c o
2
3
4
5 of politicians from different sections and parties to his cabinet. Ironically in light of his subsequent stance,
6 Calhoun introduced a bill into Congress which allowed use of government funds for internal improve-
7 ments, but Madison vetoed it the day before Monroe took office on the grounds that Congress did not
8 have the authority to do so. (In 1830 Andrew Jackson vetoed a proposed government subsidy to the
9 Maysville Road in Kentucky on the grounds that the road lay entirely within that state and could there-
30 fore not be regarded as a part of ‘interstate commerce’.) Monroe won the 1820 election without opposition
1 in the wake of the rapid decline of the Federalists, but by the late 1820s the Republicans had begun to
2 attract the same sort of criticisms that they had aimed at the Federalists in power in the 1790s over such
3 issues as centralisation and expanded government scope.
4 The 1824 Presidential election saw Andrew Jackson win most votes in the country and electoral college,
5 though not more than half. In the House of Representatives Henry Clay’s supporters voted for the son of
6 the second President, John Quincy Adams, who, once President, appointed Clay as his Secretary of State
7 (a likely stepping stone to the Presidency). The so-called ‘corrupt bargain’ damaged Adams, and the
8 Jacksonians in Congress blocked most of his legislation. By 1828 the US’s second two-party system had
9 emerged. The new parties had not originated in Washington as those of the 1790s had, but were essentially
40 coalitions of state parties. They reflected a growing interest in national politics and by the 1840s turnout
1 in national elections finally overtook that for state elections. Adams’s supporters were known as the National
2 Republicans (Whigs in the 1830s) and Jackson’s as the Democratic Republicans (Democrats in the 1830s).
3 The former were keen to preserve the economic nationalism of previous years, the latter demanded an
4 assault on privilege and established wealth in favour of wider opportunities. The vitriolic campaign of 1828
45 included accusations of murderer thrown at Jackson over his execution of militia men in the War of 1812,
46 and charges of bigamy against Jackson’s wife who had apparently not been legally divorced from her first
47 husband. She died within weeks of this attack. Although Jackson’s victory was decisive, Adams won all of
48 the north-east and much support in the mid-Atlantic region, strongly suggesting that not all voters wished
49222 to see the ‘era of the common man’ ushered in under Jackson.
‘Jacksonian Democracy’ is a term often applied to the 1820s and 1830s, but democracy was growing
before Old Hickory’s Presidency. The new states in the west had led the way in giving all white males the
right to vote and hold office regardless of property or tax qualifications and older states followed suit fearing
that people would be attracted to the west by its greater degree of democracy. In 1800 the people had
chosen Presidential electors in only 6 of the 16 states but by 1828 Presidential electors were selected by
popular vote in every state except South Carolina. In 1824 less than 27 per cent of adult white males had
voted in the Presidential election, but in 1828 the figure rose to 58 per cent, and in 1840 it had increased
to 80 per cent. It is worth noting however that in 1832 only 2 million could vote in a population of
13 million, and in reality Jackson’s ideas of democracy and equality were narrowly confined to white male
citizens in an effort to attacked entrenched privilege and vested interest. This extended to the permanent
office-holders of the federal bureaucracy, but although he is often credited with establishing the ‘spoils
system’, it should be remembered that Jackson did not remove more than 20 per cent of existing office-
holders and in 1832 Jackson’s supporters called a national convention to re-nominate him rather than
keeping the process within the elite party machine.
Despite his reservations about government power, Jackson showed the strength of his belief in the
importance of the Union during the Nullification Crisis, threatening to lead an army to South Carolina
himself if the state refused to implement the law. His speech at the annual Democratic dinner in honour
of Jefferson in 1830 proposed that the Federal Union must be preserved, in contrast to Calhoun’s subtle
toast to ‘The Union, next to our liberty most dear’.
The Democrats in the 1830s continued to advocate limited federal government except where action
might eliminate certain inequalities, and tended to support expansion, which they believed would widen
opportunities. The Whigs were generally keener on government power and believed in an economic system
including tariffs to protect domestic goods, internal improvement programmes and a national bank. They
were wary of expansion and the instability it might bring. Both parties tended to say different things in
different states to court favour. With this in mind the Whigs stood three candidates against Martin Van
Buren in 1836, in a failed attempt to prevent any candidate from achieving a majority in the Presidential
electoral college, and thereby pass on the task of choosing the President to the House of Representatives.
In 1840 however, when the election was covered for the first time by the ‘penny press’, and both parties
claimed to represent the ‘common man’, William Henry Harrison became the first Whig President –
although he died after only a month in office, and was succeeded by John Tyler. Tyler was dumped by the
Whigs before the 1844 election and he and a small group of Southern Whigs prepared to rejoin the Democrat
Party. They believed among other things that the government ought to protect and possibly expand slavery
and were also strong adherents to states’ rights.
The breakdown in the US’s second party system with the collapse of the Whigs in the 1850s had
catastrophic implications, as it served as both a prelude to and significant factor in the build-up to Civil
War. The new Republican Party, according to Eric Foner, ‘gloried in . . . materialism, social fluidity,
and the dominance of the self-made man – which 20 years earlier had been the source of widespread
anxiety and fear in Jacksonian America’ (Goodheart 1993: pp. 271–2). In 1854, the Republicans won enough
seats to allow them to control the House of Representatives with their allies among the ‘Know-Nothings’,
essentially an anti-Catholic, anti-foreign party. Following the pro-slavery result of the Dred Scott case,
Republicans showed their contempt for the verdict of the Supreme Court and, by implication, the
Constitution by claiming that when they won control of the Presidency they would ‘pack’ the Court with
new members who might reach a different decision.
Sectional animosities had been smouldering for some years. The phenomenal expansion of the country
(through the Louisiana Purchase of 1803, the acquisitions of Florida in 1819, Texas in 1845 and Oregon
in 1846, and the vast territory bought in 1848 after the Mexican War) had raised the question of whether
slavery would in turn expand. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the 1850 Compromise appeared to
resolve differences at the time, but they were too deep-rooted to disappear so easily. With expansion Native
Americans suffered, not at the hands of frontiersmen, according to Van Every, but from industrialisation
1111 and commerce, from the growth of population of railroads and cities, the rise in land values and the greed
2111 of businessmen – all sanctioned by the federal government. In 1860 the election of a Republican President,
3 Abraham Lincoln, triggered the secession of a number of Southern states from the Union, and led to Civil
4111 War. Essentially, the North fought to preserve the Union, and it was only later that Lincoln decided to
5 emancipate the slaves. Zinn has pointed out that the so-called ‘war for liberty’ also saw working people
6 attacked by soldiers for striking, Indians massacred in Colorado and perhaps 30,000 political prisoners
7 being held for criticising Lincoln’s policies (1996: p. 228).
8
9
10111 Amendments to the Constitution
1
2 The first ten amendments essentially guaranteed the rights of citizens. The list was not intended to be
3 exhaustive but free speech, freedom of the press and religion, protection of property, certain legal entitle-
4 ments, the right to bear arms, and the relationship between the states and central government were clearly
5 considered to be the most important issues not specifically covered by the Constitution.
6 The 11th Amendment (1798) stated that the judicial power of the US did not extend to a legal suit
7 against a state. The 12th Amendment (1804) stated that electors were to vote by ballot for the President
8 and Vice-President one of whom should not be from the same state as the elector. If no candidate
9 had an overall majority, the Representatives were to choose from no more than the top three, votes
20111 would be made by states with each state having one vote, and the candidate requiring a majority of states
1 to win.
2 Four years after the unsuccessful proposal of an amendment to prevent any future amendments giving
3 Congress the power to abolish or interfere with slavery in any state, the 13th Amendment (1865) was passed
4 which abolished slavery. This was followed by the 14th Amendment (1868) which guaranteed citizenship
5 to all born or naturalised in the US, with any state failing to enact black suffrage to have its representation
6 in the House of Representatives and electoral college cut proportionately. This was never enforced and it
7 became inoperative with the passage of the 15th Amendment in 1870 which disqualified certain Confederate
8 supporters from voting, and stated that the right to vote should not be denied on grounds of race, colour
9 or previous condition of servitude.
30
1
2 Judicial power
3
4 In 1801 the Federalist lame-duck Congress reduced the number of Supreme Court judges by one but
5 increased significantly the number of federal judgeships as a whole. Before he left the Presidency, Adams
6 quickly appointed Federalists to the new positions, in the so-called ‘midnight appointments’. The 1801
7 Judiciary Act was repealed but this led to a challenge in the courts over whether Adams’s ‘midnight appoint-
8 ments’ could take office. In 1796 the Supreme Court had exercised the power of judicial review for the
9 first time by upholding the validity of a law passed by Congress, but in 1803 in Marbury v. Madison
40 the Court, under Chief Justice John Marshall, declared an Act of Congress (the 1789 Judiciary Act) to be
1 unconstitutional, which meant that the Court could not compel executive officials to appoint the judges.
2 In 1819, in McCulloch v. Maryland, Marshall confirmed the ‘implied powers’ of Congress by recog-
3 nising the legality of the Bank of the United States despite great opposition to it in the South and West.
4 In 1821, in Cohens v. Virginia, Marshall showed that the power of the Supreme Court to review legal deci-
45 sions extended to state courts, asserting that the states had given up part of their sovereignty in ratifying
46 the Constitution. Under Marshall’s leadership from 1801 to 1835, the judiciary was established as a branch
47 of government which was as important as the executive and legislature. The Supreme Court also supported
48 the supremacy of the federal government over the states in regulating the economy for the good of the
49222 whole, and backed corporations and private enterprise.
Upon Marshall’s death in 1835, Andrew Jackson appointed his ally, Roger B. Taney, as Supreme Justice;
he subsequently diluted the economically nationalistic stance Marshall had tended to take. In 1837, in
Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge, Taney ruled the object of government was to promote the general
happiness and that overrode the possible breach of contract by Massachusetts regarding the building
of a bridge.
Perhaps the most significant case heard by the Supreme Court before the Civil War was that of Dred
Scott, the black slave who sued for his freedom on the grounds that he had been taken into a free territory
by his master. The Court ruled that blacks were not citizens and therefore not entitled to a Court hearing,
and that the Missouri Compromise of 1820 had in fact contravened the 5th Amendment against the seizure
of property. This was the first time since 1803 that the Court had declared an Act of Congress unconstitu-
tional, but the implications of the decision were far greater, for it implied that both the Republican Party’s
pledge to ban slavery from the western territories and Illinois Democrat Stephen Douglas’s ‘popular sover-
eignty’ (whereby the inhabitants of territory voted on whether slavery should be allowed or not) were both
unconstitutional. It also of course implied that no state had the right to exclude slavery. Taney and his judges
had hoped to resolve the sectional crisis, but only served to intensify it by outraging anti-slavery campaigners
in the North, as well as weakening the standing of the Supreme Court.
Despite there having been a civil war, apparently fought to resolve such issues, the Supreme Court still
showed that after the war it could rule in favour of the states. In the 1873 Slaughterhouse case, New Orleans
butchers claimed they had been deprived of their livelihood by a monopoly established by the state of
Louisiana, which constituted an infringement their rights under the 14th Amendment, but judges decided
that the rights of citizens should remain under state rather than federal control.
Presidential powers
It was not the intention of the Founding Fathers that the President should be dominant within the govern-
mental system established, but Article II did confer such powers on the incumbent as the making of treaties
and the appointment of Supreme Court judges (both subject to the approval of the Senate), and made him
commander-in-chief of the armed forces. The President was also to have the power of veto over legisla-
tion passed by Congress unless it achieved a two-thirds majority. Washington assumed the power to create
a national bank and to introduce an excise tax. Congress acknowledged, reluctantly, the President’s power
to dismiss members of his cabinet.
Presidents following Washington tended to follow the precedents he had set, not seeking more than
two terms in office and using their powers cautiously, although in 1803 Thomas Jefferson exceeded his
powers by concluding the Louisiana Purchase with France which expanded the country by 827,000 square
miles. The Senate later ratified the relevant treaty. Jefferson also used patronage to ensure that by the end
of his second term virtually all federal posts were held by loyal supporters. He did cut government spending
and scaled down the armed forces but, despite his reservations, the economy continued to become more
diverse and commercialised.
Andrew Jackson who served from 1829 to 1837, despite wanting to reduce the scope of federal govern-
ment, believed in strong leadership, and his introduction of the so-called ‘spoils system’ (to protect
Americans from long-term office-holders) and reliance on an unofficial ‘kitchen cabinet’ gave him greater
freedom than perhaps his predecessors had enjoyed, and pushed his powers to their limit. He used his
Presidential veto more times than all previous Presidents put together. He saw off the Bank of the United
States in 1836 although its demise left a gap which hindered the economic stability of the country. In the
1830s, in spite of a Supreme Court ruling, Jackson allowed the removal of the ‘five civilised tribes’ west-
wards, beyond the Mississippi, and in future years the federal government would break treaties made with
other Indian tribes. By the 1830s Whigs were referring to Jackson as ‘King Andrew I’, despite the Democrats’
supposed advocacy of limited federal government. Zinn chooses to remember ‘Jackson the slaveholder, land
speculator, executioner of dissident soldiers, exterminator of Indians’ (1996: p. 129).
1111 John Tyler became President in 1841 – following William Henry Harrison’s death from pneumonia
2111 after making a long inaugural speech in the rain. Despite being a Whig, Tyler had been a Democrat, and
3 once in power ‘His Accidency’ agreed to bills abolishing Van Buren’s independent Treasury system and
4111 higher tariffs, refused to re-charter the Bank of the United States and vetoed internal improvement bills.
5 As a result his own party dumped him. James K. Polk (1845–9) his successor, pursued a war with Mexico
6 which resulted in the US acquiring vast new areas of territory. Under James Buchanan (1857–61) the
7 Presidency was brought into disrepute. He was reluctant to intervene to alleviate the growing crisis and
8 did little to check the drift towards war. He proved to be indecisive at vital moments, and seemed to lack
9 understanding of the strength of feeling that existed on both sides, particularly the North.
10111 Lincoln (1861–5), recently voted the greatest President in a survey of US History professors, exceeded
1 his powers during the Civil War by sending men into battle without Congress declaring war (although he
2 argued that because it was a domestic conflict he did not need to seek their permission), increased the size
3 of the regular army without legal authority, and unilaterally declared a naval blockade of the South as well
4 as suspending habeas corpus and imprisoning opponents, occupying Baltimore to stop border states
5 seceding, turning Missouri and Maryland into an occupied state to safeguard Washington, and seizing
6 Northern telegraph offices during the first three months of the war. Chief Justice Taney ruled that he had
7 exceeded his powers in declaring the Emancipation Proclamation and there can be no doubt that had he
8 survived the war he would have found himself at odds with the Radicals in his party who wished to control
9 the process of Reconstruction. He did not however extend the powers of the President in any permanent
20111 way. Lincoln’s ideas for Reconstruction (a process which in actual fact started during the war, although
1 writers tend to opt for 1865 as a starting date) were more or less followed after his death by his successor
2 Andrew Johnson, who was initially welcomed to the office by Radical Republicans. Johnson has the dubious
3 honour of being the first President ever to be impeached by Congress. The charges brought against him
4 were motivated purely by the wish for revenge on the part of those who believed he had wilfully obstructed
5 Congressional attempts to introduce equal rights for blacks after the war and generally done his best to
6 frustrate Radical Reconstruction. They were undoubtedly correct in their assessment, but Johnson had not
7 exceeded his powers, and enough senators saw sense to prevent the impeachment finding him guilty.
8
9
30 The constitutional impact of the Civil War and its aftermath
1
2 Eric Foner has argued that ‘what was at stake in 1860, as in the entire sectional conflict, was the character
3 of the nation’s future’ (Goodheart 1993: p. 274) adding that: ‘In a sense, the Constitution and national
4 political system had failed in the difficult task of creating a nation – only the Civil War itself would accom-
5 plish it’ (p. 276). Shelby Foote has argued that any understanding of the US has to be based on an
6 understanding of the Civil War, and that the war defined the US and its people (Burns 1989). Celia O’Leary
7 has argued that what it meant to be an American remained undefined after the war, with regional differ-
8 ences persisting, class conflict increasing, mass immigration, the unresolved position of freed blacks, and
9 continued bitterness in the South (1994).
40 What must be determined by anyone attempting to measure the impact of the war is what would have
1 changed without it and what would not. The withdrawal of Southern Democrats from Congress in 1860
2 left the Republicans with a majority which they used to pass measures that could never have been passed
3 had the Democrats stayed. The Homestead Act of 1862 put up 50 million acres of public land for sale in
4 160 acre lots, most of which were bought up by speculators. An additional 100 million acres was given by
45 Congress to the railroads, and a national bank was also set up. The greatest impact the war made however
46 was on the lives of four million black slaves who were set free by the 13th Amendment, and in that sense
47 the war could be said to be truly revolutionary. The rebel states would not be readmitted to the Union
48 unless they agreed to the 13th Amendment and that very fact highlights that slavery could not have been
49222 abolished constitutionally without the war.
The war resolved the questions over the nature of the Union and marked a triumph of federal over
state power. After the war federal spending remained well above pre-war levels although national govern-
ment continued to have little direct impact on most Americans. Having said that it is perhaps significant
that the first ten amendments to the Constitution had attempted to limit the power of federal government
while six of the next seven after the war empowered the government to act. The dominance of the North
and capitalism was assured, with more tariff laws introduced postbellum, as well as a uniform currency
and federal support for railroad construction.
Patrick O’Brien has suggested the interpretations of historians such as Beard, that the war marked a
turning point in the economic life of the nation and represented the war as a triumph for free market
capitalism over a feudal-type South, should be treated with care and feels that, in purely material terms,
the Civil War did not pay (1988: p. 69), with both North and South suffering as a result. Several of those
industrialists and financiers who emerged as ‘robber barons’ in later years took advantage of the oppor-
tunities created by the war and large-scale production was possibly accelerated, while a shortage of labour
in the North stimulated a greater use of technology. Some argue that the major changes in agriculture,
industry and transport had started before the war, and that although war may have been a catalyst for
economic development it did not essentially change direction. Others have even argued that the war retarded
economic growth. In the South there was industrial development and urban growth after the war, but it
remained the poorest section of the US for another hundred years.
‘Reconstruction’, the term generally given to the period after the war has been debated hotly by
historians with Dunning (1907) blaming a vindictive and power-seeking group of Northern Radical
Republicans for hardships endured by the South. Du Bois (1935) saw Northern intentions as more altru-
istic in wanting to create a more democratic society in the South; and although Foner (1988) has said that
Reconstruction can be judged a failure in terms of not securing for blacks’ rights as citizens and free
labourers, in many other ways the period brought great progress for blacks, including the holding of
political office and economic advancement. Reconstruction also saw Presidential authority set against
the power of Congress. Johnson vetoed the First Reconstruction Act because of the legal powers given
to the military and Congress used a range of devices to block the testing of the Reconstruction Acts in the
Supreme Court – there was even talk of the Radicals abolishing the Supreme Court altogether. The Tenure
of Office Act passed in March 1867 was a ploy by Radicals to prevent the President from removing from
office their ally in cabinet, Secretary of War Stanton, without the Senate’s consent; and the Command of
the Army Act prohibited the President from issuing military orders except through the commanding officer
of the army and also from relieving him or assigning him elsewhere without Senate approval. Both laws
appeared to violate the Constitution and Johnson sacked Stanton to enable a test case to be brought.
Johnson’s impeachment was an attempt by Congress to exceed its powers and its motives were essentially
political, but even so he stood no chance of becoming President again.
The reassertion of power by Congress continued after the war, and it was not until Theodore Roosevelt
in the early twentieth century that a more dominant President emerged. Dunning argued melodramatically
that the single vote by which Johnson escaped conviction marked the margin by which the Presidency
escaped destruction (not until 1926 did the Supreme Court declare the Tenure in Office Act unconstitu-
tional). The seven Republicans who voted with the Democrats to acquit Johnson feared permanent damage
to the Presidency, and that Benjamin Wade might succeed him. They effectively sacrificed their political
careers to scupper the unscrupulous tactics of the Radicals.
By the end of Ulysses Grant’s first term in office a number of ‘Liberal Republicans’ had come to oppose
‘Grantism’ and allied themselves with the Democrats to nominate Horace Greeley. In 1877, however, there
was again a Republican in the White House, following an election marked by fraud and corrupt bargaining
on both sides. ‘The Compromise of 1877’ ensured that Southern whites would restore their dominance in
the region. By 1877, whites had reached what Maldwyn Jones has called a ‘modus vivendi’ at the expense
of blacks who would be isolated and marginalised for decades to come (1995: p. 259).
ESSAYS • 19
1111 National politics certainly changed course after the war. Prior to the war Southern slaveholders had
2111 held the Presidency for 49 years and the Supreme Court had always had a Southern majority. Following
3 the war it was to be 100 years before a President came from a former rebel state, and over the next 50 years
4111 only 5 of the 26 Supreme Court judges were to be Southerners. Only two Democrat Presidents were elected
5 in the 70 years up until 1930, although elections between 1876 and 1892 were very close. James McPherson
6 (1990) calls this fundamental shift in the balance of political power between North and South a revolu-
7 tion, but it would have probably happened without the war, and the imminence of change was partly
8 why the South left the Union in any case. What the war did was to remove the social and political system
9 of the South and change the basis of its workforce and economic system.
10111 In the first week of July 1877 in Baltimore, where all the liquid sewage ran through the streets,
1 139 babies died. When the railroad strikes of 1877 were over, a hundred people were dead and a thousand
2 had been to jail. Economically the US was a less equal society than it had been in 1763, but the Union
3 had survived, and the Constitution had evolved through amendment and interpretation during a period
4 of dramatic changes, to produce a system of government which prohibited slavery and had attempted to
5 guarantee equal political rights for African Americans.
6
7
8 Part 2: Essays
9
20111
The writing of the Constitution
1
2
1 Read the following Source and then answer the questions that follow.
3
4 An extract from Article I Section I of the US Constitution, 1787:
5
All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall
6
consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.
7
8 (a) Using the Source and your own knowledge explain briefly who would sit in
9 Congress. (3)
30
(b) Outline the concept of the ‘separation of powers’ as applied by the Founding Fathers
1
to the Constitution. (7)
2
3 (c) To what extent were the Founding Fathers primarily concerned with creating a
4 federal government of limited power? (15)
5 (AQA)
6
7 (a) The Senate would be composed of two members from each state, ensuring that every state regardless
8 of size had equality in at least one of the chambers of Congress, and senators initially would be indirectly
9 elected. Those congressmen who were to sit in the House of Representatives were to be directly elected,
40 and the bigger the population of a state the more members it was entitled to, thereby guaranteeing the
1 bigger states greater say and voting power.
2
3 (b) The concept of the separation of powers as applied to the US Constitution was influenced by the writ-
4 ings of the political philosopher, Montesquieu, which were, ironically, based on his misunderstanding of
45 the working of the British constitution. The powers refer to the three branches of government established
46 by the Founding Fathers and the idea behind separation was that each branch would carry out a different
47 function: the Executive (which was regarded with most suspicion by Americans) would carry out govern-
48 ment; the Legislature would debate and pass laws; and the Judiciary, or at least a Supreme Court, would
49222 enforce the law, although the scope of its powers was vaguely defined.
The idea that no person should be a member of more than one branch of government at any one
time was also part of the concept, with the one exception of the Vice-President who was entitled to sit in
the Senate, but not to speak or cast a vote other than in the event of a tie. The separation was designed
to ensure that too much power would not be allowed to accumulate in any branch of government or
with any one individual. It could also be argued that the 10th Amendment to the Constitution which
distinguished between state powers and federal powers was also an attempt to separate powers.
(c) The term ‘limited power’ needs to be considered carefully because limited power simply implies that
there were rules created which restricted the scope of federal government, and it does not necessarily mean
that federal government had little power. It is also worth considering the idea of limited power from two
perspectives. If the 1787 Constitution is compared with the Articles of Confederation clearly the power at
the centre had been increased massively at the expense of state sovereignty. For example under the new
Constitution the federal government could levy taxes, regulate foreign and interstate trade and pass laws
more easily than under the Articles, so if the word ‘limited’ is taken to mean reduced then clearly this was
not the case in comparison with the Articles which had left the concept of state sovereignty firmly intact.
If one compares the power of federal government with that of the British government before the war
however, then the system created by the Founding Fathers certainly did place limits on government power.
It was limited by the separation of powers internally to ensure that no one branch of government or indi-
vidual became too powerful. The powers of each chamber of the legislature were limited with respect to
each other; and the frequency of elections, particularly for the House of Representatives, ensured that repre-
sentatives could be replaced at regular intervals if necessary. The power of federal government was further
limited by the Bill of Rights which outlined certain freedoms that could not be restricted or interfered with
by the federal government, and of course the 10th Amendment firmly stated that states would broadly
retain jurisdiction over areas not designated to federal government. The Bill of Rights was not of course
originally intended by the Founding Fathers nor part of the original Constitution; neither did many envisage
that the Supreme Court would also come to limit the power of government by ruling laws to be uncon-
stitutional. It can however be argued that the Founding Fathers did intend to create a government of limited
power – anything else in the wake of the war and the ‘tyranny of King George’ would have been unac-
ceptable to the majority of Americans – but they also intended to create a government with just enough
power to ensure that the country did not descend into petty squabbling and disunity, that would count for
something on the international stage, and could pay off its debts.
An extract from Richard Henry Lee’s proposal to amend the new Constitution, September 1787:
. . . it is submitted
That the new Constitution proposed for the Government of the U. States be bottomed upon a
declaration, or Bill of Rights . . .
(a) Using the Source and your own knowledge explain why Richard Henry Lee felt it
necessary that a bill of rights be added to the Constitution. (3)
(b) How far were individual rights a consideration when writing the Constitution? (7)
(c) To what extent were eighteenth-century views of property rights and hereditary power
challenged by the US Constitution? (15)
(AQA)
(a) Richard Henry Lee represented the fears of those who felt that the Constitution would give too much
power to the federal government. The writers of the Constitution had presumed that, with such concepts
as the ‘separation of powers’ and the checks and balances which had been built into the document, individual
ESSAYS • 21
1111 rights would be safeguarded against an over-mighty central government. Lee and others however wanted
2111 to ensure that certain rights, such as free speech and freedom from arbitrary arrest, would be guaranteed
3 by the Constitution as well as getting a specific statement on where the jurisdiction/power of the federal
4111 government stopped, and that of the individual states applied.
5
6 (b) There is no doubt that the American Constitution of 1787 was the most democratic of its time, and
7 there is thus a strong argument that individual rights were an important consideration in its framing. The
8 precise influence of Enlightenment thinkers such as Locke and Rousseau is difficult to gauge, as is that of
9 Thomas Paine, but certain extracts from the Constitution would indicate that individual rights were
10111 important. The fact that the right to stand for such offices as President or senator were not limited by
1 wealth or property qualifications would suggest that individual rights were being taken seriously, but
2 however progressive that may sound in theory, in reality it would not be possible for simply anyone to find
3 the resources on which to base a campaign to become President. Other individual rights included protec-
4 tion from arbitrary arrest, the safeguarding of property, the right to vote for government representatives
5 (although states would decide who could vote), and the enactment that citizens of each state would be
6 entitled to all the rights extended to citizens of any other state. It was also decided that holding office would
7 not be impeded by anyone’s religious beliefs.
8 Individual rights outlined in the Constitution were of course essentially limited to white males. It was
9 simply assumed that females, Native Americans and blacks were not part of the deal and it could not have
20111 worked if they had been. Black slaves were regarded as personal property, while free blacks were certainly
1 not regarded as the equals of whites, even in the North, where very few were even permitted to vote.
2 The fact that a bill of rights had to be promised before certain states would ratify suggests that the Founding
3 Fathers had not gone far enough for many, and if the articles of the Constitution are examined, it would
4 seem that the priorities as far as the Founding Fathers were concerned tended to be the relationships between
5 the branches of government, how the members of the branches of government would be selected and the
6 powers that the federal government would wield.
7
8 (c) It can be argued that contemporary views of hereditary power were shattered by the Founding Fathers,
9 but in fact property rights were uppermost in the minds of those who wrote the Constitution, which was
30 designed to safeguard the rights of property: to ensure that it would effectively be property owners who
1 held influence in the new system even though in theory neither wealth nor property ownership were required
2 to stand for office. The indirect voting for the President and the Senate was clearly an attempt to dilute
3 the influence of popular forces; and although titles of nobility were barred by the Constitution that did
4 not prevent the elites from handing down their huge estates and wealth to the next generations of their
5 families or concentrating political power in their own hands.
6 Having said that, the fact that the new nation’s head of state and members of the legislature would
7 actually be elected was an astonishing step for the time in relation to other countries, although it might be
8 argued that most of the states were more democratic than the new federal system established, with many
9 of them having annually elected legislatures. It should also be remembered there had been discussions about
40 Prince Henry of Prussia becoming monarch of the US, and there were some who felt that the President
1 should be elected for life. In the end, with so much of the blame for the breakdown in relations between
2 the states and Britain being put on George III and the need for a constitution that would be acceptable to
3 the majority, it would have been very difficult to justify the creation of a King Washington for example.
4 So there would be no hereditary monarch and nor would there be a hereditary upper chamber of the legis-
45 lature resembling the House of Lords in Britain. But that did not mean that Congress would be filled with
46 small farmers, mechanics and artisans.
47 It can actually be argued that the Constitution reinforced eighteenth-century views of property rights
48 with its acknowledgement of slavery and bonded servitude, and safeguards on seizures of property. Madison
49222 asserted that Republican government was needed to maintain peace in a society riddled with factional
disputes which arose from ‘various and unequal distribution of property’. The Founding Fathers them-
selves were property owners and it made sense for them to create a system in which their interests would
flourish. The rebellion led by Daniel Shays in 1786, which seemed to threaten the fabric of a social system
based on property ownership, certainly made many think more seriously about revising the Articles of
Confederation. In the new Constitution the electoral college voting systems for the President and the Senate
were clearly devices by which popular feeling might be watered down and the real decision-making be left
to people of more substance. In this way they managed, as Heale has put it, to ‘reconcile hierarchy with
democracy’.
It is also worth examining Article I Section 8 of the Constitution to gain an insight into what the
Founding Fathers were concerned about: areas such as trade and finance, which a property-owning elite
might be expected to prioritise. Gore Vidal’s comment that ‘the system established was the best sort of
government for White Anglo-Saxon Protestant men of property to do business in’ has probably proved to
be correct.
An extract taken from the Annapolis Convention of 1786:
. . . there are important defects in the System of Federal Government . . . and . . . embarrassments
which characterise the present state of our national affairs, foreign and domestic . . .
(a) Using the Source and your own knowledge summarise briefly the main defects in the
Articles of Confederation to which the members of the Annapolis Convention referred.
(3)
(b) To what extent was the Constitution based on practical considerations rather than
principle? (7)
(c) ‘The Founding Fathers wrote a Constitution that suited themselves.’ Comment on this
statement in light of the social positions and views of the men who framed the
Constitution. (15)
(AQA)
(a) The members of the Annapolis Convention were concerned that the Articles of Confederation did not
confer sufficient power on Congress to deal effectively with the problems that appeared to face the country
at the end of the war. Such problems included ‘domestic’ ones such as paying off the country’s debt, lack
of a uniform currency, and the lack of an efficient way of ensuring law and order, and ‘foreign’ ones such
as diplomatic status and defence. The war had highlighted the problems of raising taxes and soldiers in a
situation where 9 of the 13 states needed to agree for major decisions to be passed, and unanimity was
required to amend the Articles.
(b) Many of the issues with which the Founding Fathers were concerned were what could be described as
practical issues rather than ones based on deeply felt principles or political philosophies. There is no doubt
that writers such as Locke, Montesquieu, Rousseau and Paine influenced the men at Philadelphia to some
degree, and that ideas concerning individual rights and democracy played their part, but in many ways the
problems which perturbed the elites of the country were the lack of unity and uniformity, how to enforce
law and order and weak diplomatic status. These concerns were the driving forces behind the actions of
the men at Annapolis, who in 1786 voted to call a convention of state representatives at Philadelphia
to redraft the Articles of Confederation.
With war over it had become apparent to some that the Articles of Confederation were insufficient to
bind the states together in any meaningful way, although, following the Treaty of Paris, many could see
ESSAYS • 23
1111 no reason for the states to be bound more closely. The majority continued to identify more with their own
2111 states rather than their nation. But men who shared a national vision, such as Alexander Hamilton, found
3 that they could not stand by while states imposed tariffs at different rates, unilaterally made wars and treaties
4111 with Indian tribes, set different requirements for naturalisation, disputed land ownership with each other,
5 and issued a variety of currencies. Equally of concern to them were the problems at national level, with a
6 Congress unable to pay off war debts, deal with the post-war depression, adequately defend the country or
7 persuade the British and Spanish to honour the terms of the Treaty of Paris. Hamilton wrote: ‘There is
8 something . . . contemptible in the prospect of a number of petty states . . . fluctuating and unhappy at
9 home, weak and insignificant by their dissensions in the eyes of other nations.’ The rebellion of debtors
10111 in Massachusetts, led by Daniel Shays in 1786, raised additional fears about the security of loans and the
1 potential for lawlessness among the better off such as Edmund Randolph, who saw ‘the prospect of anarchy
2 from the laxity of government’. Alex Waddan sees the economic dislocation of the period as the main factor
3 prompting the creation of a stronger central government.
4 Article I Section 8 of the Constitution itself is really the best evidence for the hard-headed practicality
5 of the Founding Fathers with regard to the day-to-day functioning of government. It covers the raising of
6 tax, coining of money, standardisation of weights and measures, the establishment of post offices and patents
7 for inventions and the raising of armies. It can also be argued that all the compromises made to secure the
8 creation and ratification of the Constitution were examples of pragmatism. Anti-slavery principles were
9 laid aside to ensure the support of Southern states regarding the three-fifths clause on counting slaves.
20111 South Carolina and Georgia (the only two states which had not banned the slave trade) were allowed to
1 continue the importation of slaves for another 20 years. Smaller states were bought off by equal represen-
2 tation in the Senate. Northern commercial interest was assuaged by the simple majority in Congress needed
3 to regulate trade, future migrants west were promised equal representation and a bill of rights was added
4 to win over waverers; while it could be argued that women, Indians and slaves were all excluded on practical
5 grounds.
6
7 (c) Edward Countryman has said: ‘It was not the people who clamored for a Constitution, but rather a
8 small, elite group of men who began the movement by writing letters to one another, essays in newspapers,
9 and legal opinions.’
30 The best-known supporter of this line was Charles Beard who, in 1913, argued that the Founding
1 Fathers were the spokesmen for an elite, keen to protect rights of property (including slaves and bonded
2 servants). He argued that, apart from the repression of violence, the main purpose of any government
3 is to make rules which determine the property relations of its citizens. Clinton Rossiter has called the 55
4 Founding Fathers ‘an elite of an elite’, and they certainly did not represent a microcosm of the population
5 as a whole; their average age was around 40, with 13 owning plantations, 16 owning slaves, 30 possessing
6 academic degrees at a time when few when to college, 13 being lawyers (although 36 had trained in law),
7 8 being merchants, 12 being state office-holders and 42 having served in Congress. Bonwick points out
8 that no shopkeepers, artisans, or westerners, nor tenant farmers, served and there was only one small
9 farmer. Rossiter, however, does not believe that the men were particularly self-interested, and maintains
40 that ‘devotion to the public good and concern for the national reputation’ were the driving forces behind
1 the document.
2 Having said that, 30 to 40 held financial interests in public securities which would surely appreciate
3 in value with a more stable government and possibly half had money loaned out on interest. Rossiter argues
4 that five of the largest holders of certificates of public debt voted against the Constitution and Forrest
45 McDonald has shown that among the Founding Fathers and members of the ratifying Convention, owner-
46 ship of depreciated paper had no significant influence on whether men voted for or against the Constitution.
47 Nevertheless a new national government could vote for the taxation needed to pay off debts, and those
48 holding securities could stop the use of devalued paper money by debtors. They could also stimulate manu-
49222 facturing with tariffs on foreign goods, regulate trade and shipping, open up western lands for speculation
and take action against Indians where necessary, and put down insurrections, as well as offering security
against slave revolts and support to recapture runaways. For men of property who clearly favoured stability
and prospects for future wealth these possibilities must have seemed most appealing, and in this light
Howard Zinn’s comments that the ‘document becomes not simply the work of wise men trying to estab-
lish a decent and orderly society, but the work of certain groups trying to maintain their privileges, while
giving just enough rights and liberties to enough of the people to ensure popular support’ become
compelling.
The Constitution in practice
4 To what extent had the compromises agreed in the Constitution broken down
by 1861? (60)
(OCR)
The main compromises made in the Constitution were between the large states and the small states, between
North and South, between slave and free, and between those who favoured states’ rights and those favouring
more central power. By 1861 the compromises had largely been eroded by seemingly fundamental differ-
ences of opinion over such issues as slavery, or more accurately the expansion of slavery, and the power
of the federal government over the states. These differences had increasingly been exacerbated by an exag-
gerated sense of a North–South divide which served to increase sectional tensions, and fuel rival conspiracy
theories.
The so-called ‘Great Compromise’ between the large and small states in terms of Congressional repre-
sentation seemed to survive the 70 years following the writing of the Constitution, but the question of how
much power the federal government should wield became an issue from the very early days of the new
nation. Within only ten years of the Constitution being framed, a party system which was essentially based
around attitudes towards federal power had appeared in the US.
The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions of 1798/9, written by Madison and Jefferson respectively, estab-
lished a precedent for the argument that the states had formed a contract with the central government and
whenever that central government exceeded the terms of the contract the states had the right to nullify the
relevant laws. There was little support for this at the time, but when John Calhoun adopted a similar line
regarding South Carolina’s refusal to recognise a high tariff (Tariff of Abominations) set by Congress in
1828, it was only the lack of support from the other states that made his home state decide not to secede
from the Union.
Slavery is often regarded as the major difference between North and South and yet the ‘peculiar insti-
tution’ (as Southerners called it) could be examined under a ‘states’ rights’ or ‘economy’ heading along-
side the tariff. That, of course, is to ignore the moral objections to slavery and the part it played in rival
conspiracy theories as the country moved towards Civil War. To argue that the states’ rights issue was
paramount in the South’s secession from the Union and slavery just happened to be one particular state
right is to grossly oversimplify, for slavery was at the root of North/South differences and animosities,
both real and imagined, and by 1860 it seemed that the future of slavery within the still expanding Union
was exactly what could not be peaceably resolved. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 had maintained the
equal ratio of slave to free states in the Senate and the northern boundary of slavery, and the 1850
Compromise also seemed to have resolved tensions, but the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 brought up the
future of slavery question once more, and this time it would not be avoided by discussion and deals.
Prominent Republicans Seward and Lincoln stated that a house divided could not permanently endure,
that the Union could not survive half free and half slave, and yet Lincoln stated he had no intention to
interfere with slavery where it already existed. Southerners did not believe him, and they were right not to,
for by 1862 he had broken his word and decided to free the slaves. As the debate on slavery became more
ESSAYS • 25
1111 a moral one, it could only be a matter of time before the issue, compromised on in 1787, came to a head.
2111 The future of the US was as a country without slavery – but it would take a war and the death of over half
3 a million white men to achieve it.
4111
5 5 To what extent was the 13th Amendment the most far-reaching amendment to
6 the Constitution before 1877? (60)
7 (OCR)
8
In many respects the 13th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution during Reconstruction were the most
9
far-reaching to date. They attempted to redress the most hypocritical elements of the Constitution, which
10111
had recognised slaves as property and permitted freed blacks to be treated as second-class citizens.
1
The 1st Amendment, regarding free speech, might be regarded as extremely important, and of course
2
the fact that it was the first suggests that free speech was a priority – and yet it was a freedom of speech
3
restricted to whites. The passage of the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798 also demonstrated that a government
4
with a will could seriously undermine that particular amendment.
5
The right to bear arms has had significant repercussions for life after the Revolution in the US although
6
the wording of the 2nd Amendment clearly reflects the times in which the Constitution was written. Many
7
would also argue that the 5th Amendment has gained a certain notoriety in high-profile legal cases when
8
those on trial do not want to bear witness against themselves.
9
The relationship between the states, as defined in the 10th Amendment, was essential to the federal
20111
system itself. The fact that the wording of the amendment was ‘The powers not delegated to the United
1
States . . . are reserved to the States . . . or people’ rather than ‘The powers not “specifically” delegated
2
. . .’ has allowed the federal government a certain amount of room for manoeuvre and broad interpretation
3
of its powers on occasions.
4
The 14th Amendment was superseded by the 15th, but the 15th was undermined by Southern laws
5
which prevented blacks from voting for a range of reasons, thus getting around the wording of the amend-
6
ment. It could be argued, of course, that in many ways the economic system in the South post-
7
bellum came greatly to resemble that of slavery, given that blacks in large numbers stayed on the land
8
they had worked as slaves and paid rent to white owners. Black vagrants also became liable to being hired
9
out, but the important point was that slavery had been abolished, bringing massive legal, political, social
30
and psychological changes for whites as well as blacks. The abolition of slavery fundamentally altered
1
the path US society would take and must therefore be regarded as the most far-reaching amendment
2
to the Constitution by 1877.
3
4 6 ‘The Constitution of 1787 contained the seeds of Civil War.’ Discuss. (60)
5 (OCR)
6
7
Essay plan
8
9 Introduction: Give a broad outline of the areas to be covered in the answer, i.e. issues determined or unre-
40 solved by the Constitution which contained the potential for future disagreement, and other possible
1 causes of the war which could not have been foreseen when the Constitution was written.
2
Para 1: The issue of states’ rights versus federal powers, particularly the wording of the 10th Amendment,
3
which allowed the federal government some scope for broad construction of the Constitution and
4
would lead to much dispute.
45
46 Para 2: Linking to para 1, how the Constitution effectively regarded slaves as property, and did not deter-
47 mine that any law related to regulation of trade required a two-thirds majority in Congress, as
48 many Southern states wished.
49222
Para 3: The establishment of a Supreme Court of judges nominated by Presidents who tended to be
supportive of the federal government, e.g. Dred Scott decision.
Para 4: The electoral college system of choosing a President allowed sectional candidates to win on a
minority of the popular vote, e.g. Lincoln in 1860.
Para 5: The Senate having equal representation kept the issue of slavery smouldering– had the Senate’s
representation been based on population the South would have been eclipsed much earlier. This
might have meant the Southern states seceding earlier and possibly being too strong for the Northern
states to risk war.
Para 6: There being nothing in the Constitution about the legal right to secede, nor about expansion and
how to deal with new territories. This could link to para 7.
Para 7: Arguments that other issues were at the root of the problem e.g. slavery (which pre-dated the
Constitution), the expansion of slavery (which did not seem likely in 1787), war with Mexico, the
rise in support for abolitionism in the North and the ‘blundering politicians’ of the 1850s.
Conclusion: The extent to which the Constitution contained the seeds of Civil War measured against other
factors, with an attempt to determine what might be the major flaw of the document in relation
to war.
7 To what extent was the President more influential in 1877 than in 1763? (60)
(OCR)
Essay plan
Introduction: Discuss briefly the difference between the legal power of the President, the role that individual
personalities played in enhancing the scope of the position, and how earlier views of the President’s
role shifted over time.
Para 1: Examine the initial views of the role the President would play and Washington’s interpretation of
his own position.
Para 2: Assess whether the legal position of President changed in any way over the period.
Para 3: Determine whether the context of the times, such as war and Lincoln, and Reconstruction and
Johnson, had an impact on the President’s influence.
Para 4: Assess whether the personality of the President had an influence on the position, e.g. Washington,
Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln.
Para 5: Examine the idea that the Civil War was a watershed in terms of Presidential power, given
that it was followed by Congressional Reconstruction, the impeachment of Johnson and the
Presidency coming into disrepute under Grant.
Conclusion: The extent to which the President had become more influential by 1877. It may be possible to
argue that although the Presidency had become more influential after Washington, its influence
had been curtailed after the war.
ESSAYS • 27
1111 PRACTICE QUESTIONS

2111
8 How far were the differences between the two main parties in American politics between
3
1763 and 1877 based on contrasting views of the Constitution? (60)
4111
(OCR)
5
6
Advice: A strong grasp of the two-party system and the parties involved over the time period stated is clearly
7
needed before attempting such a specialist question. The answer to this could also be approached in a funda-
8
mentally chronological way, starting off with the disputes between Federalists and Anti-Federalists during the
9
ratification of the Constitution, which led on to the differences over the power of federal government during the
10111
1790s and 1800s, and finishing with Democrat/Republican differences over the nature of the Union, slavery and
1
states’ rights. On the other hand a more thematic approach could be taken by concentrating paragraphs around
2
key areas such as states’ rights.
3
4
5 9 ‘The Supreme Court played a crucial role in shaping the development of the US between
6 1763 and 1877.’ Discuss. (60)
7 (OCR)
8
9 Advice: In this answer, there should be a number of references to judicial review, and there must be good know-
20111 ledge and understanding of: landmark decisions by the Supreme Court, such as McCulloch v. Maryland and
1 Dred Scott; influential chief justices such as Marshall and Taney; and the general support the Supreme Court
2 showed for federal government and business during the period. The question is a specialist one and really does
3 require detailed knowledge and understanding.
4
5
6 The significance of the Civil War
7
8 10 How far do you agree that the Civil War was the key turning point in the development
9 of the US from 1763 to 1877? (60)
30 (OCR)
1
2 The term ‘key turning point’ suggests the US took a significantly different path from the one it would have
3 taken had the war not taken place. This contention is clearly open to debate, and it must be examined from
4 economic and social as well as political perspectives. The abolition of slavery is perhaps the key to answering
5 the question, in that had war not happened the prospects of gaining a two-thirds vote in Congress plus the
6 support of three-quarters of the states were remote. Lincoln had expanded the powers of the Presidency
7 during the war, but Johnson’s impeachment and Grant’s tainted terms in office saw a return to a less domi-
8 nant Presidency. Lincoln talked of ‘fundamental and astounding changes’ resulting from the war, but he
9 had little chance to speak with any real perspective and neither did those who spoke in revolutionary terms
40 before the 1860s were over, although their initial reactions to the effects of the war should not be discounted.
1 Charles Beard took a Marxist line, seeing the war as a victory for capitalism over feudalism. Most now
2 regard this view as a gross oversimplification but capitalism certainly flourished after the war. There is,
3 however, a great deal of debate over the economic impact of the war. Some feel that the war may actually
4 have retarded economic growth, while others feel it stimulated the use of technology and accelerated large-
45 scale production and acted as a catalyst rather than fundamentally altering the course of the country’s
46 development.
47 In recent times, Shelby Foote has argued that the war defined the country although Celia O’Leary
48 has said that what it meant to be American remained undefined with loyalties continuing to be diverse
49222 and regional differences persisting. There is certainly plenty of evidence that the United States remained
very much a disunited society after the war, particularly during the ‘Gilded Age’, when the gap between
the poorest and richest grew massively, and union action became increasingly violent in the face of unsym-
pathetic employers, courts and government. It should be remembered that many Northerners had strongly
resented Lincoln turning the conflict into a ‘nigger war’ while organisations of Confederate veterans refused
to accept cultural defeat long after peace had been signed. Writers such as Degler and McPherson have to
some extent sympathised with Foote and been happy to call the Civil War ‘America’s second revolution’.
Clearly the main results of the war were the triumph of the Union and the emancipation of black
slaves. The Union existed before the war and so it could be argued that the war was fought to prevent
change rather than to hasten it, but the war had determined what the nature of that Union would be in
the long term, and certainly where states’ rights would stand in relation to federal power, although for most
people after the war it was still state governments which continued to play a greater part in their lives than
Washington, despite greater taxation and involvement from the centre. The abolition of slavery was clearly
a fundamental change in US society although it could be argued that blacks remained very much second-
class citizens for decades after the war. Neither was the abolition of slavery simply a case of freeing four
million black people – it had huge economic, social and political implications, particularly in the South
which was hugely affected by the war. The war had devastated large areas of the region as well as funda-
mentally changing its social and economic systems. Southern incomes continued to fall after the war and
agricultural production dropped significantly. The war confirmed the dominance of the Republican Party
and by implication the North. After the war, a hundred years would pass before a Southerner became
President again. And this pattern was repeated in other areas of national government, such as the Supreme
Court where only five of the next 26 appointees would come from the South.
Part 3: Sources
1 The struggle to ratify the Constitution
■ Source A: Extract from George Washington’s letter accompanying the draft of the
Constitution, 17 September 1787
The friends of our country have long seen and desired, that the power of making war, peace and treaties,
that of levying money and regulating commerce, and the correspondent executive and judicial authorities
should be fully and effectually vested in the general government of the Union . . . Individuals entering into
society, must give up a share of liberty to preserve the rest.
■ Source B: Extract from a petition against ratification, presented to the Freemen of

Pennsylvania, January 1788
That the powers therein proposed to be granted to the government of the United States are too great,
and that the proposed distribution of those powers are dangerous and inimical to liberty and equality
amongst the people. That they esteem frequent elections and rotation in offices as the greatest bulwark of
freedom. That they conceive standing armies in times of peace are not only expensive but dangerous
to our liberty, and that a well-organised militia will be the proper security for our defence.
■ Source C: Extract from speech by James Winthrop, Anti-Federalist of Massachusetts, 1787
A few years ago, we fought for liberty . . . we placed the State Legislatures, in whom the people have a full
and fair representation, between the Congress and the people . . . Now it is proposed to go into the contrary,
SOURCES • 29
1111 and a more dangerous extreme – to remove all barriers, to give the new government free access to our
2111 pockets, and ample command of our persons, and that without providing for a genuine and fair repre-
3 sentation of the people.
4111
5 ■ Source D: 10th Federalist Paper by James Madison, 1788
6
7 Among the numerous advantages promised by a well constructed Union, none deserves to be more accu-
8 rately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction . . . By a faction, I understand
9 a number of citizens . . . of interest adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate
10111 interests of the community . . . Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an ailment without which it instantly
1 expires. But it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life . . . A rage for paper
2 money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property, or for any other improper or wicked
3 project, will be less apt to pervade the whole body of the Union than a particular member of it . . .
4
5
OCR QUESTION FORMAT
6
7 The questions and answers that follow are based on the OCR style.
8
9 (a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain what Washington
20111 meant when he said that individuals ‘must give up a share of liberty to preserve the
1 rest’. (20)
2
(b) Study Sources B and C. How far does Source C support the views expressed in Source B
3
that the Constitution gives too much power to the federal government? (40)
4
5 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all the Sources and your own knowledge explain the extent to
6 which practicalities rather than idealistic political principles were the main motives of the
7 Founding Fathers in writing the Constitution. (60)
8
9 (a) The historian Maldwyn Jones wrote The Limits of Liberty, in which he implied that in any society there
30 must be rules (which by definition restrict individual freedom) in order to preserve a broader sort of freedom.
1 John Locke advanced a similar argument – that one man’s liberty stops at the point where it begins to inter-
2 fere with another man’s liberty. When Washington proposed that individuals must give up some freedom
3 to preserve the rest he meant that, although the Constitution, in creating a central government with greater
4 powers, may restrict some forms of freedom, it would be worth it for the wider benefits which society as a
5 whole would gain, such as more ordered commerce, law and order, and greater diplomatic power.
6
7 (b) The petition of Source B is very direct in terms of its criticisms, stating that the powers ‘to be granted
8 to the government . . . are too great’ and the ‘distribution of those powers . . . dangerous and inimical to
9 liberty and equality’, as well as suggesting that more frequent elections are needed and standing armies may
40 be a problem. James Winthrop in Source C also uses the word ‘dangerous’ when discussing government
1 power, but is more specific than Source B in actually outlining which powers were too great, i.e. the power
2 to tax and power over individuals. Source B clearly feels specifically that elections are not frequent enough,
3 while Winthrop makes a more general comment regarding ‘unfair representation of the people’, which may
4 not just be referring to frequency of elections. Overall, Source C supports broadly the ideas in Source B
45 that government has too much power, and the representative system set up is unsatisfactory.
46
47 (c) Those men who met at Annapolis in 1786 and voted to call a convention to redraft the Articles of
48 Confederation were essentially motivated by the lack of unity and status of the states, and also problems
49222 of law and order. States at that time imposed tariffs at different rates, issued diverse currencies, concluded
their own treaties with Indian tribes and quarrelled with each other over territory. At a national level,
Congress could not pay off war debts, do much to deal with the economic downturn or enforce the terms
of the Treaty of Paris. Article I Section 8 of the Constitution covers issues such as raising taxes, coining
money, standardising weights and measures, establishing post offices and raising armies, and gives an insight
into what was on the minds of those at Philadelphia. Washington, in Source A, tends to reinforce the
importance of practical issues by speaking of ‘the power of making war, peace and treaties . . . levying
money . . . regulating commerce . . . and . . . Individuals . . . [giving] up a share of liberty to preserve the
rest’. It is also well known that Washington’s whole attitude towards redrafting the Articles of Confederation
was bordering on the apathetic until Shays’ Rebellion of 1786 made him think again about the importance
of preserving law and order. But his ideas of giving up some liberty ‘to preserve the rest’ went too far for
some, and James Winthrop in Source C suggests that the new federal government held powers ‘without
providing for a genuine and fair representation of the people’.
It can be argued that every compromise made at the Philadelphia Convention on issues such as slavery
and the representation of the large and small states, plus the decision to accept a bill of rights, confirms
that a streak of ruthless pragmatism ran through the minds of those who were the driving forces behind
the Constitutional settlement. Having said that, to argue the Founding Fathers were totally without idealism
or principle would be misleading. The ideas of Locke, Rousseau, Montesquieu and Paine played their part.
The ‘separation of powers’ was designed to ensure tyrannical government did not occur, the President and
senators were to be elected indirectly by the people for four and six years respectively, while congressmen
would be elected directly by the people (albeit a majority of white males) for two years at a time. These
arrangements alone made the US the most democratic country in the world at the time, and if there
were those who argued that the federal government had too much power, Federalists were quick to point
out that law and order were often essential to preserving liberty. For the petitioners in Source B however
the powers of the new government seemed ‘dangerous and inimical’ to the lofty principles of liberty and
equality. The petitioners also complained of standing armies in peacetime, which was hardly surprising
given that the standing army the British had left in America after the Seven Years War had proved expen-
sive and ultimately been used against the colonists. Again this reflects that one of the priorities of the
Founding Fathers was to keep an army on hand to protect the country and possibly to be used to main-
tain law and order. The speed and heavy-handedness with which the Whiskey Rebellion was put down
during Washington’s Presidency would doubtless have confirmed to the Founding Fathers they had been
right to create safeguards against such disorder.
The motives of the Founding Fathers are portrayed in an even less favourable light by Madison in
Source D. His views appear to be positively unprincipled with him openly stating that he sees one of the
advantages of the new Constitution as being its capacity to impose law and order, to reduce faction and
to prevent demands for ‘paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property’. Madison
concedes the importance of liberty of a kind but in many respects this appears to be a liberty on his own
terms rather than a genuinely principled definition of freedom. It is perhaps not surprising that many
pushed for 10 Amendments to be added to the Constitution. By 1791 the Bill of Rights was clearly the part
of the Constitution which was most strongly based on principled motives, and yet ironically it was the only
part of the Constitution which had not been written at Philadephia by the Founding Fathers.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE

(a) Study Source B. From this Source and your own knowledge explain why the petitioners
prefer a ‘well-organised militia’ to ‘standing armies’. (20)
(b) Study Sources A and D. How far does Source D support Washington’s view that a certain
amount of liberty must be given up to preserve liberty on a broader scale? (40)
(c) Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain the extent to which the new
Constitution actually restricted the freedom of the American people. (60)
SOURCES • 31
1111
2111 2 The debate over the power of federal government
3
4111 ■ Source A: Extract from the 1st Amendment to the Constitution
5
6 Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;
7 or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble,
8 and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
9
■ Source B: The Sedition Act 1798
10111
1
. . . That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish . . . any false, scandalous and malicious writing
2
. . . against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress . . . or the President . . .
3
with intent to defame . . . or to bring them . . . into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them . . .
4
the hatred of the good people of the United States . . . then such person, being thereof convicted . . . shall
5
be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.
6
7 ■ Source C: The Virginia Resolution 1798
8
9 . . . a spirit has in sundry instances, been manifested by the federal government, to enlarge its powers by
20111 forced constructions of the constitutional charter which defines them . . . (which . . . in the former articles
1 of confederation were the less liable to be misconstrued) . . . That the General Assembly doth particularly
2 protest against the palpable and alarming infractions of the Constitution, in the two late cases of the ‘Alien
3 and Sedition Acts’ . . . the first of which exercises a power nowhere delegated to the federal government
4 . . . but on the contrary, [is] expressly and positively forbidden by one of the amendments.
5
6 ■ Source D: The Kentucky Resolution 1799
7
8 . . . That if those who administer the general government be permitted to transgress the limits fixed by that
9 compact [i.e. the Constitution], by a total disregard to the special delegations of power therein contained,
30 annihilation of the state governments, and the erection upon their ruins, of a general consolidated govern-
1 ment, will be the inevitable consequence: That the principle and construction contended for by sundry of
2 the state legislatures, that the general government is the exclusive judge of the extent of the powers dele-
3 gated to it, stop nothing short of despotism . . . That the several states who formed that instrument,
4 being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of its infraction; and that a nulli-
5 fication, by those sovereignties, of all unauthorised acts done under color of that instrument, is the rightful
6 remedy . . . that the said alien and sedition laws, are in their opinion, palpable violations of the said
7 constitution . . .
8
9 OCR QUESTION FORMAT
1
2 (a) Study Source D. From this Source and your own knowledge explain what is meant by the
3 phrase ‘nothing short of despotism’. (20)
4
(b) Study Sources C and D. How far do Sources C and D support the view that the federal
45
government had attempted to enlarge its own powers? (40)
46
47 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all the Sources and your own knowledge explain the extent to
48 which the broad constructionists of government power had won the battle against strict
49222 constructionists within 40 years of the Philadelphia Convention. (60)
(a) The phrase ‘nothing short of despotism’ is used by Thomas Jefferson in the Kentucky Resolution to
criticise the idea that it is for the federal government itself to determine the extent of its own powers. This
document was written after the Supreme Court in 1796 had upheld the validity of a law passed by Congress,
but before an act of Congress had ever been declared unconstitutional by the Court. The 10th Amendment
had laid down the basis of the power relationship between states and centre but there were those who
believed that the terms of the Constitution could be broadly construed to give the federal government
greater scope where necessary. Jefferson was very much opposed to this interpretation of the Constitution
and clearly used the term ‘despotism’ in an emotive way to galvanise feeling against the repressive Alien
and Sedition Acts, which he regarded as unconstitutional, and to imply that the federal government had
behaved in a tyrannical and oppressive way by supporting the passage of these laws.
(b) The Virginia Resolution (Source C) suggests that federal government had sought to ‘enlarge its powers’
by interpreting the role given to it by the Constitution too widely, and even goes further in its accusations
by claiming it had acted illegally by passing the Alien Act, which Madison claimed to be directly contrary
to one of the amendments. The Kentucky Resolution implies that ‘those who administer the general govern-
ment’ had been allowed to overstep the limits laid down by the Constitution, and expresses grave concern
that the federal government be regarded as ‘the exclusive judge’ of its own powers. Source D also uses the
expression ‘transgress the limits fixed by that compact’ to suggest that the federal government has ‘over-
stepped the mark’. Madison, in Source C, towards the end of the piece, addressed the Alien and Sedition
Acts more specifically, which he believed to be examples of the government enlarging its powers and
violating the Constitution. Both Sources could not be more condemning of federal government’s attempts
to enlarge its powers.
(c) The 10th Amendment, stating that the powers not delegated to the United States would be reserved
to the states or people, was approved without the word ‘expressly’ preceding ‘delegated’. This vagueness
was significant for it led to much debate in years to come, but essentially it gave the federal government
plenty of room for manoeuvre. It became an important element in the debate between those who felt that
the powers granted to the federal government in the Constitution should be construed literally and strictly,
and those who wanted to use a broader interpretation, effectively allowing the government greater powers
than those specifically outlined. The first party system emerged as a result of the differences between broad
and strict constructionists.
Hamilton led the Federalists arguing for broad construction and ‘implied powers’ for the government,
with Washington trying to remain above it all; while the Anti-Federalists became known as the Democratic-
Republicans and followed Jefferson’s lead, campaigning for minimal state interference and championing
states’ rights. Under Hamilton the government created a Bank of the United States in 1791, raised taxes
and passed a tariff act. Other actions that brought opposition from those who felt the government was
exceeding its powers included the heavy-handed treatment of those involved in the Whiskey Rebellion in
1794, and also the pro-British policy pursued during the Napoleonic Wars. It was partly in response to
opposition to this pro-British policy and the French-supported Irish Rebellion of 1798 that Congress passed
the Alien Act in 1798, aiming to reduce immigration and encourage some recent arrivals to leave. On paper
the terms of the Act appear to be potentially appallingly oppressive for they stated that, if the US was at
war with or threatened by another nation, any citizen of that nation living in the US could be liable to
arrest or removal from the country. However, in practice it was not used by Adams to deport anyone.
In the same year the Sedition Act was passed which appeared to encroach on such liberties as ‘freedom
of speech, or the press’ by outlawing ‘false, scandalous and malicious writing . . . against the government’.
It was however upheld by the Supreme Court, and was used to arrest and convict ten men, most of whom
were Republican newspaper editors. Although again, in practice, Adams restrained Federalists from perse-
cuting opponents. Supporters of the Act could argue that the law simply clarified the 1st Amendment which
had in any case never intended to allow complete freedom of speech.
HISTORICAL SKILLS • 33
1111 Jefferson’s idea of ‘nullification’ and that the states had the ‘right to judge’ the legality of any law, as
2111 expressed in Source D, had no constitutional basis. But neither did the American Revolution, which had
3 been justified on the grounds that the British government had exceeded its powers coupled with various
4111 political theories of men such as John Locke. Madison’s criticisms of the Alien and Sedition Acts as an
5 attempt by the federal government to ‘enlarge its powers’ in Source C did not arouse much support across
6 the country and neither did Jefferson’s. Once in power, Jefferson himself realised that he could not always
7 avoid a policy of minimal government interference, and, for example, he exceeded his powers as President
8 in negotiating the Louisiana Purchase from France.
9 As early as 1796 the Supreme Court exercised judicial review by upholding a law which had been passed
10111 by Congress. This decision seemed to indicate that judges appointed by the President would always back
1 the government line, but in another case in 1803, Marbury v. Madison, the Court declared the Judiciary
2 Act of 1789 unconstitutional, and for the first time demonstrated how the judiciary could ‘check and
3 balance’ the executive. This gave ‘strict constructionists’ some hope, but under the leadership of John
4 Marshall the Supreme Court tended to back the supremacy of the federal government over the states and
5 to sympathise with the idea of ‘implied powers’ which Hamilton had advocated so strongly. Indeed in 1819,
6 in McCulloch v. Maryland, Marshall confirmed the ‘implied powers’ of Congress by giving recognition to
7 the legality of the Bank of the United States; and in 1821, in Cohens v. Virginia, Marshall set a precedent
8 for the Supreme Court to review legal decisions made in the state courts, arguing that the states had given
9 up part of their sovereignty in ratifying the Constitution. By around 1830 the strict constructionists appeared
20111 to have lost the battle against those who wished to expand the role and powers of federal government.
1
2 ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE
3
4 (a) Study Source D. From this Source and your own knowledge explain how legitimate the
5 doctrine of nullification was. (20)
6 (b) Study Sources C and D. How far does Source C support the view expressed in Source D
7 that the Alien and Sedition Acts are unconstitutional? (40)
8
9 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge assess the
30 significance of the states’ rights issue in the US between 1787 and 1860. (60)
1
2
3 Part 4: Historical skills
4
5 1 Write your own constitution
6
7 In groups of two or three, put together a democratic constitution of your own. It should be loosely struc-
8 tured around a bill of rights, rules for elections, and the structures involved in creating an executive, a
9 legislature and judiciary. Working in small groups will highlight the problems of reaching a consensus on
40 a range of decisions where people may have widely differing views.
1 The exercise could be extended to allow a ‘whole class constitution’ to be produced.
2
3
4 2 A debate on the Constitution of 1787
45
46 Students should divided into two groups: one representing the Federalists who supported the new
47 Constitution, the other the Anti-Federalists who had grave misgivings about many aspects of the docu-
48 ment. Each group should work on a series of key points and rebuttals to enable a debate to take place over
49222 the potential merits and disadvantages of the document.
Sources and references
Anthony Bennett, ‘The United States Supreme Court’, Hamilton Jay Madison, ‘The Federalist, Phoenix Press
Politics Review, April (2000). (2000).
Colin Bonwick, The American Revolution, Palgrave (1991). John M. Murrin, Paul E. Johnson, James M. McPherson
Colin Bonwick, ‘Thomas Jefferson – Pragmatist or et al., Liberty Equality Power, Harcourt (2001).
Visionary?’, History Today, April (1993). Patrick O’Brien, The Economic Effects of the American Civil
Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, McGraw-Hill War, Macmillan (1988).
(2000). Celia O’Leary, ‘Americans All: Reforging a National
Ken Burns, The Civil War (video), DD Video (1989). Brotherhood, 1876–1917’, History Today, October
Channel 4, ‘Liberty’, episode 4 (1997). (1994).
Simon Collinson, ‘President or King?’, History Today, Thomas Paine, Political Writings, edited by Bruce Kuklick,
November (2000). Cambridge University Press (1989).
Edward Countryman (ed.), What did the Constitution Mean Jack Rakove, ‘The Great Compromise’, History Today,
to Early Americans?, Bedford/St Martin’s (1999). September (1989).
Eric Evans, Liberal Democracies, JMB (1990). Leonard Richards, Shays’ Rebellion: The American Revolu-
Eric Foner, Politics and Ideology in the Age of the Civil tion’s Final Battle, University of Pennsylvania Press
War, Oxford University Press (1980). Quoted in (2003).
Lawrence Goodheart, Richard Brown and Stephen Clinton Rossiter, 1787: The Grand Convention, Norton
Rabe (eds), Problems in American Civilisation, D.C. (1987).
Heath (1993). Matt Salusbury, ‘The Dollar’s Doleful Debut’, BBC History
M.J. Heale, The American Revolution, Methuen (1986). Magazine, January (2002).
Robert Hole, ‘The American Declaration of Independence Alex Waddan, ‘Presidents and Leadership’, Politics Review,
of 4th July 1776’, History Review, March (2001). February (1998).
James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, Penguin Alex Waddan, ‘Reviewing the Constitution of the United
(1990). States’, Politics Review, February (1999).
Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
Press (1983/1995). Longman (1996).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 3
5
6
7
8
9 The Origins of the American
10111
1
2
Civil War, 1840–1861
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111
1 This chapter will examine the debates over slavery, states’ rights and federal rights, and the
2 sectional differences which gave rise to the secession of the Confederate states and the subse-
3 quent outbreak of the American Civil War.
4
5
6
7 Historical background Sources
8
9 Introduction 1 Understanding the Northern perspective
30 The problems of territorial expansion and 2 Understanding the Southern perspective
1 attempts at compromise
2 Economic differences and the moral implications
3 of slavery Historical skills
4 States’ rights and nationalism
5 Sectional divisions and conspiracy theories 1 Conspiracy everywhere
6 Leadership: politicians and parties 2 Who was most to blame?
7 Conclusion
8
9
40 Essays
1
2 Expansion and slavery
3 Irresponsible agitators and blundering
4 politicians
45 Motives for secession and fighting
46
47
48
49222
36 • THE ORIGINS OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR, 1840–1861
Chronology
1820 Missouri Compromise

1831 First issue of The Liberator published
Nat Turner Revolt
1832–3 Nullification Crisis
1836 Texas won independence from Mexico
1840 Whig William Harrison elected President
1841 Harrison died and Tyler became President
1844 Democrat James Polk elected President
1845 Congress agreed to annex Texas
1846 Beginning of Mexican War
Wilmot Proviso
1847 Calhoun Doctrine (Platform of the South)
1848 End of Mexican War
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
Whig Zachary Taylor elected President
1850 Zachary Taylor died and replaced by Millard Fillmore
Henry Clay’s Compromise of 1850
California admitted as a free state
1851–2 Uncle Tom’s Cabin published
1852 Democrat Franklin Pierce elected President
1853 Gadsden Purchase
1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act passed (which led to ‘Bleeding Kansas’)
Republican Party founded
Ostend Manifesto
1856 ‘Bleeding Sumner’
Pottawatomie Massacre’
James Buchanan elected President
1857 Dred Scott decision by Supreme Court
‘Panic’ of 1857
Lecompton Constitution adopted in Kansas
1858 Lincoln–Douglas debates
1859 John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry
Execution of John Brown
1860 Lincoln elected President
Secession of South Carolina
1861 Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas left the Union
Kansas admitted as a free state
Confederacy established and Jefferson Davis chosen as President
Fort Sumter Crisis
Second wave of secession: Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee left
the Union
1111
2111
3
4111 Introduction
5
6 Having been elected President of the Confederacy, in his inaugural speech of 1861, Jefferson Davis
7 proclaimed it was ‘the American idea that governments rest upon the consent of the governed’, and added
8 that it was ‘the right of the people to alter or abolish governments whenever they become destructive of
9 the ends for which they were established’. Although secession of Southern states from the Union did not
10111 necessarily have to lead to armed conflict, President Abraham Lincoln, and the majority of Northerners,
1 felt so strongly that the precedent of states leaving the Union might lead to its ultimate disintegration, they
2 were prepared to fight a war which left well over half a million dead – as many as were lost in all other
3 wars the US has fought added together. By the time the war was over, the fight to preserve the Union had
4 taken on a higher goal, and the victory of the North in 1865 ensured that nearly four million black slaves
5 would be freed.
6 Prior to taking office in a letter of December 1860 to Alexander Stephens, future Vice-President of the
7 Confederacy, Lincoln reasserted the public pledge he had made not to interfere with slavery where it already
8 existed , but added: ‘I suppose, however, this does not meet the case. You think slavery is right and ought
9 to be extended, while we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted. That I suppose is the rub. It certainly
20111 is the only substantial difference between us.’ In March 1861, Stephens himself seemed to confirm the
1 importance of slavery by saying: ‘African slavery . . . was the immediate cause of the late rupture.’ South
2 Carolina’s declaration of the immediate causes of its secession argued that ‘an increasing hostility on the
3 part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery’ had contributed in rendering the compact
4 between the states invalid. It can be argued that slavery played a part in every pre-war crisis and the fact
5 that the Confederate Constitution written in 1861, apart from differences in provisions for elections and
6 the safeguarding of slavery, virtually replicated the document drafted at Philadelphia in 1787, would also
7 suggest that the South’s ‘peculiar institution’ was at the root of problems.
8 If slavery was however at the root of the decision of Southern states to secede following Lincoln’s elec-
9 tion as President, there was a certain illogicality to it. Given that the Republican Party which had nominated
30 Lincoln had only existed since 1856, there was no guarantee that it would continue to be successful, and
1 although Lincoln won the Presidency in 1860 (with less than 40 per cent of the popular vote) the Republicans
2 did not have control of either House of Congress, and therefore could have done little in the short term
3 to affect slavery. The Dred Scott decision made by the Supreme Court in 1857 had ruled that a slave
4 taken into a so-called ‘free territory’ would still be classified a slave, which seemed to imply that Congress
5 had no power whatever to prevent the expansion of slavery. The North feared the Supreme Court would
6 next rule that the states could not exclude slavery. For slavery to be abolished, therefore, a Constitutional
7 amendment would be required, i.e. a two-thirds majority in both Houses of Congress plus ratification
8 by three-quarters of the states. In 1860, 15 of the 33 states in the Union (or 45 per cent) were slave states.
9 At present 50 states make up the US, which raises the hypothetical absurdity that had those 15 states
40 continued to uphold the existence of slavery, the ‘peculiar institution’ could still exist today. Unthinkable
1 as this may be, the war did ultimately provide a solution to what, in Republican William Seward’s words,
2 appeared to be ‘an irreconcilable conflict’.
3 To regard the protection of slavery as the main cause of Southern secession is one thing, but to see
4 the abolition of slavery as the main reason Northerners went to war in 1861 is untenable. Lincoln
45 knew that to declare the abolition of slavery as an initial war aim would be political suicide, and could well
46 be the death knell of the Union if it provoked the four border slave states (none of which had voted for
47 him as President in 1860) to secede as well, so instead he committed the North to war solely to preserve
48 the Union. He had however argued that ‘a house divided against itself ’ (on the issue of slavery) could not
49222 stand, and that he expected it to ‘become all one thing, or all the other’. During the Lincoln–Douglas
debates of the Illinois election campaign for the Senate in 1858, Stephen Douglas pointed out that Lincoln
appeared to be ignoring the fact that ‘the divided house’ had stood since the 1780s, and, perhaps not surpris-
ingly, the South refused to be reassured by his promise not to interfere with slavery where it already existed.
Slavery was also essentially what made the South the South, although some writers have even
questioned whether the region should be described as a ‘slaveholding society’ given that only 25 per cent
of white families owned any slaves at all, and in some towns slaves were hired out or required to simply
yield a percentage of their earnings to their masters. There were in fact ‘many Souths’, and conditions
varied considerably from state to state. Half the Southern slave owners owned five or fewer slaves and
often worked side by side with them. And in 1832 the legislature of Virginia, the most powerful Southern
state, voted by a surprisingly narrow margin, given the influence of slave owners, to retain slavery.
The problems of territorial expansion and attempts at compromise
Territorial expansion westwards lay at the root of the United States’ problems leading up to the Civil War.
As more land was acquired by the nation, and pioneers, potential settlers, prospectors, and those hoping
to practise their religion free from persecution, continued to travel west, so more territories would
apply to become new states in the Union. This in turn would raise the issue of whether these new states
would be pro-slavery or free. Missouri was the first territory from the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 to apply
for statehood, and the associated Missouri Compromise of 1820 highlights perfectly the dilemma expan-
sion brought with it. At the time the slave states and free states were equally balanced in the Senate. If
Missouri joined as a slave state it would tip the balance in favour of the South. Henry Clay’s solution was
to create a new free state called Maine out of part of Massachusetts, and to ban slavery in the Louisiana
Purchase above a line of latitude 36° 30′.
It may have appeared that, on balance, the North bene-
fited more than the South from Henry Clay’s ‘1850
Figure 3.1 Stephen A. Douglas
Compromise’ over the land acquired from Mexico, given
that the free states gained a majority in the Senate with
the admission of California, but the senators California
returned were so ‘dough-faced’ that the balance was not, in
reality, tipped against the South. Some historians have also
argued that the new Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, which
supposedly made it easier to recapture escaped slaves,
proved very difficult to enforce. Although, according to
Murrin et al., 84 fugitives were actually returned to slavery
with only 5 released in the first 15 months of the law’s oper-
ation (2001: p. 375). Hardly any slaves were taken to New
Mexico and Utah (part of the land acquired from Mexico),
which made it unlikely that either territory would eventu-
ally become a slave state.
A further acquisition of land from Mexico in the
Gadsden Purchase of 1854 aroused Northern suspicion
and opposition to the possibility that a Southern trans-
continental railroad might be built, and it was the drive to
build a Northern transcontinental railroad which was to lead
to an intensification of the crisis. In order to remove the
objections to a northern route (that would run through
unorganised territory guaranteed free soil by the Missouri
Compromise of 1820), Illinois’ Stephen Douglas promoted
1111 the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which proposed that the settlers in each area should vote along
2111 the lines of ‘popular sovereignty’ on whether they accepted slavery or not. All Southern members of the
3 Democrat Party and nearly all Southern members of the Whig Party voted for the Kansas-Nebraska Act,
4111 while every Northern Whig voted against it, and Northern Democrats split down the middle. The new law
5 instantly nullified the Missouri Compromise line, but, more importantly, precipitated the collapse of the
6 Whig Party and led to the foundation of the Republican Party as well as widespread violence in Kansas. At
7 a stroke, Douglas, who had underestimated the depth of Northern anti-slavery feeling, revived sectional
8 hostilities, weakened his own Democrat Party and jeopardised his own future hopes of becoming President.
9
10111
1 Economic differences and the moral implications of slavery
2
3 There were certainly differences between North and South economically, and it could be argued that slavery
4 was at the root of those differences. There has been a tendency to assume that the South was economically
5 backward compared to the North. Although this should not be exaggerated, it does seem that despite growth
6 in the Southern economy, it did not really develop, and the region remained more reluctant than the North
7 to embrace new technology. It is true that the North had greater diversity than the South, and between
8 1800 and 1860 the proportion of the Northern labour force engaged in agriculture fell from 70 per cent to
9 40 per cent, while the Southern proportion remained constant at approximately 80 per cent; also only
20111 approximately 10 per cent of Southerners lived in urban areas compared with 25 per cent of Northerners.
1 In the 1920s, progressive historians Charles and Mary Beard argued that the war was one fought
2 between capitalism and feudalism – an expanding commercialised North fighting a static agrarian South
3 for power – and that the North essentially fought for its own economic interests. Most Republican support
4 however appears to have come from small farmers rather than big businessmen favouring further indus-
5 trialisation, and the Republican Party was clearly divided on issues such as the tariff, the need for a national
6 bank and nativism, as well as embracing a range of views on the position of blacks in society. Eric Foner
7 has argued that ‘free labour’ lay at the heart of Republican ideology, perhaps confirming the economic
8 motive; and in 1858 William Seward made a similar point, saying that the social systems of slave labour
9 and free labour were incompatible. The North’s belief in free labour however did not extend to free trade,
30 and the tariff question continued to cause dissension.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
40
1
2
3
4
45
46 Figure 3.2
47 Anti-slavery
48 cartoon,
49222 1839
The North’s reluctance to allow the Confederacy to exist independently certainly made sense on
economic grounds. The South provided 60 per cent of all US exports and it has been estimated that 15–20
per cent of the price of raw cotton went into the pockets of creditors, insurers, owners of warehouses and
shipowners, most of whom were Northerners or British. An independent Confederacy could have put an
end to a lucrative market for Northern products, reduced Northern control of Southern trade and stopped
the free transit of Northern goods down the Mississippi.
To many Northerners slavery was simply an economic issue, but as time went on more came to see it
as a moral issue. It would seem that from the 1830s, in the wake of increasing attacks on slavery from
Northern abolitionists, Southerners decided to stop apologising for the existence of their ‘peculiar institu-
tion’ as a necessary evil, and actively started to justify slavery, comparing it favourably with ‘wage slavery’
in the North, and claiming that blacks were inferior. William Lloyd Garrison was the man who gave the
flagging anti-slavery movement renewed impetus, and he demanded the immediate abolition of slavery.
He set up his own newspaper in 1831 and the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1833, which had over a
quarter of a million members within five years.
Abolitionism experienced divisions in its ranks during the years to come and, although never repre-
senting the majority view in the North, it did serve both to irritate the South and influence Northern
opinion. Frederick Douglass’s Narrative, describing his life as a slave in Maryland, published in 1845, and
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, published in 1852, also undoubtedly raised the consciousness
of many Northerners – the latter sold more than two million copies over the next ten years. Claims that
it won thousands of converts to the anti-slavery cause are probably exaggerated, although Lincoln is reputed
to have said to Stowe on meeting her in 1862: ‘So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that made
this great war.’ Millions of Northerners apparently moved closer to an anti-slavery position after the 1850
Compromise when armed slave catchers began to appear on their streets. Seizures of ‘fugitives’ who had
lived for years in the North panicked thousands of blacks in the North to head for Canada, or to arm
themselves, and there were several instances of violence where the authorities attempted to arrest or hold
fugitives.
States’ rights and nationalism
Jefferson Davis claimed that the South had fought for states’ rights rather than to save slavery, but it is
difficult to avoid the conclusion that the state right of paramount importance to the South was the right
to own slaves. Hugh Brogan notes that the states’ rights doctrine had evolved out of the necessity to protect
slavery (1985/1999: p. 317), but in 1832 South Carolina had threatened secession over the tariff, and as
early as 1799 Thomas Jefferson had championed states’ rights in the face of the draconian Alien and Sedition
Acts. When the Supreme Court made its infamous decision regarding the status of black slave Dred Scott
in 1857 it ruled that no slave could become free by virtue of simply living in a free territory. The implica-
tions of Dred Scott were that neither Congress nor an individual state could legally bar slavery from any
land. This represented a major blow to the right of states to determine whether slavery should exist or not
within its borders, but this defeat for states’ rights was lost amid the rejoicing south of the Potomac.
In terms of nationalism there is a strong argument that the war created Southern nationalism rather
than the other way round, but slavery was a vital element, in many ways actually defining the South.
Maldwyn Jones asserts that ‘secession challenged the ideological basis of American nationalism as the mass
of Northerners had come to understand it . . . They had learned . . . to identify the Union with liberty and
democracy and to feel that the maintenance of territorial integrity was the touchstone of the experiment
in popular government begun in 1776’ (1983/1995: p. 216). Little wonder that the Republican Party
election slogan of 1856 – ‘Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men, Fremont’ – went down well in the North.
In 1861 Northern soldier Sullivan Ballou seemed to have little doubt about his cause, writing, before battle,
in a letter to his wife: ‘My love of country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly
1111 . . . to the battlefield’ (Burns 1989). For General Robert E. Lee, who opposed slavery and secession, ‘country’
2111 meant his home state of Virginia, and when Virginia decided to join the Confederacy so did he, rather than
3 accept Lincoln’s offer of command over Union forces.
4111 In the 1940s/1950s, Bell Wiley argued that the letters of soldiers seemed to reveal that they were influ-
5 enced by friends, pay, fear of future conscription, a sense of duty and a vaguely defined but strongly felt
6 love of country, as well as a hostility towards those who seemed intent on destroying it. McPherson has
7 suggested that ideological factors played a major part in sustaining the will of soldiers to fight. Contemporary
8 Northern author Nathaniel Hawthorne summed up the confusion: ‘We have gone to war, and we seem to
9 have little, or, at least, a very misty idea of what we are fighting for . . . The Southern man will say, we fight
10111 for states’ rights, liberty, and independence. The middle and Western states-man will avow that he fights
1 for the Union; whilst our Northern and Eastern man will swear that, from the beginning, his only idea was
2 liberty to the Blacks, and the annihilation of slavery’ (Burns 1989).
3
4
5 Sectional divisions and conspiracy theories
6
7 Recently historians have tended to stress what the North and South had in common, such as British descent,
8 protestantism, language, legal system and political beliefs, rather than concentrate on their differences.
9 Writers now generally accept that the ‘conflict of cultures’ theory has been exaggerated as a cause of the
20111 crisis, but there is no doubt that crude stereotyped depictions of North and South were widely accepted in
1 the build-up to hostilities, and the conspiracy theories of ‘slave power’ versus ‘black republicanism’ gained
2 more and more credibility as time went on.
3 It has also been argued that, despite having much in common, by about 1850 the two sections had
4 become distinctly different. The South appears to have been a more violent region than the North to the
5
6 Figure 3.3 Map illustrating slave and free states on the eve of the American Civil War
7
8
9 WASH
IN
30 G
TO
1
N TERR
2 OREGON MINNESOTA
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3 MI
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C
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4 Y G
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NEBRASKA TERRITORY
6 Lake City IOWA
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Chicago IN NJ New York
F
Burlington
7 UTAH DI
AN OHIO Pittsburgh Philadelphia
O
TERRITORY COLORADO ILLINOIS A MD

TERRITORY
8 KANSAS DEL
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Indianapolis Washington
Topeka St. Louis
N
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9 Angeles Sante Fe MISSOURI
VIRGINIA Norfolk
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AND KENTUCKY
40
A
Raleigh
NEW MEXICO UNORGANIZED TENNESSEE N. CAROLINA
1 TERRITORY TERRITORY ARKANSAS Memphis
S. CAROLINA
2
MIS
GEORGIA Charleston
3
SIS
TEXAS ALABAMA
L OU
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4 Free States
I SI
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45 New Orleans Slave States
FL
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46 Territories
ID
47
A
0 400 miles
48
49222
extent that Southerners were somehow ‘less civilised’ than their Northern counterparts. Bryan Holden Reid,
for example, has pointed to the ‘casual attitude of the secessionists to the use of force’ (1996: p. 399) and
maintains that the South was the aggressive party relishing the prospect of war and deluding itself that the
war would be won with ease (p. 384).
From the late 1830s the idea of the ‘slave power’ took hold in the North, with increasingly aggressive
justifications of slavery by Southerners prompted by abolitionist attacks, which in turn gave abolitionists
further evidence of a conspiracy of Southern slaveholders ‘to foist slavery upon the nation, destroy civil
liberty, extend slavery into the territories (possibly to whites), reopen the slave trade, control the policies
of the federal government, and complete the formation of an aristocracy founded upon and fostered by a
slave economy (Nye 1949: p. 20). Others point to sectional agitators, such as John Tyler and John Calhoun,
both political outsiders whose careers had been blocked by the major parties, and who clearly stood to gain
from such conspiracy theories and also from slavery becoming a national issue. There were even extrem-
ists who claimed that the Southern ‘slave-ocracy’ had been responsible for the deaths by poison of two
Presidents and had tried to kill three others.
Further evidence that seemed to justify the existence of a conspiracy of slaveholders included:
• the Gag Rule, which prevented debates over slavery in Congress between 1836 and 1844;
• two-thirds of volunteer soldiers in the Mexican War had come from slave states, which could indicate
that the war itself was fought for Southern interests, especially given that President Polk who went to
war with Mexico seemed very reluctant to secure the whole of Oregon in the north-west;
• some expansionist Democrats had even wanted to take the whole of Mexico;
• various Southern-led expeditions to invade Cuba and Nicaragua in the 1850s;
• calls to reopen the African slave trade;
• the beating of Northern senator Charles Sumner by Southern congressman Preston Brooks in 1856,
which gained the Republicans thousands of votes; and
• President Buchanan’s acceptance of Kansas’s pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution and the pressure he
brought to bear on the Supreme Court over the Dred Scott decision.
In reality there was no conspiracy, although most white Southerners were united in supporting the insti-
tution of slavery, despite the fact that the vast majority of them did not own slaves. Nevertheless, according
to Foner, it was the fear of ‘slave power’ that gave the Republicans the anti-aristocratic appeal which men
like Seward had long wished for and was the ‘ideological glue’ of the party (1993: pp. 272–3).
On the other side of the coin, Southern leaders insisted that they had been forced out of the Union
by a ‘black republican’ conspiracy that aimed to destroy slavery once and for all. In January 1831 the first
edition of William Lloyd Garrison’s abolitionist paper, The Liberator, came off the presses – and within
only a few months 60 whites had been killed in Virginia in the Nat Turner slave revolt. Further abolitionist
agitation and national events seemed to confirm Southern fears, and many historians have argued that John
Brown’s raid in 1859, which again raised the spectre of slave rebellion, was the single most important factor
in causing the war. Having dominated the Presidency and membership of the Supreme Court until the
1850s, Southerners came to see themselves as constituting a permanent minority grouping, whose interests
would be ignored or trampled on by a tyrannical Northern majority. The fact that the Republican-
dominated Congress, in the absence of Southern Democrats during the war, took the opportunity to pass
bills on proposals that they knew Southerners opposed, suggests that they may well have been right.
Leadership: politicians and parties
In the 1940s, ‘Revisionists’ led by James Randall and Avery Craven claimed that politicians and agitators
of both sides were unusually incompetent. Alan Nevins has declared that the 30th Congress, which met in
1111 December 1847, contained a ‘galaxy of talent’ perhaps never equalled before or since – but within five years
2111 three of the stars, Clay, Calhoun and Webster, were dead. It could be argued that the slavery question had
3 simply reached a point at which it demanded an answer, and politicians who were more ideologically
4111 committed than earlier generations were prepared to provide it.
5 Many have blamed Buchanan for escalating the conflict, and he certainly appears to have been reluc-
6 tant to act decisively to prevent the ‘general drift to war’, and it was ultimately Buchanan’s record as
7 President that gave Lincoln his chance. In contrast to Buchanan’s apparent ineptitude, the Republican Party
8 proved itself rather adept at attracting all the different groups opposed to the Democrats. It offered such
9 incentives as 160-acre homesteads, subsidies for a transcontinental railroad and higher tariffs, and managed
10111 to focus on republicanism rather than black slavery in the run-up to 1860. The Republicans also ensured
1 that Seward, who had alienated the ‘Know-Nothings’, was not selected as Presidential candidate in 1860,
2 but rather ‘Honest Abe’ Lincoln, who stood in contrast to rival candidates Douglas and Breckinridge, both
3 tainted by their connections with the Buchanan administration. Nativists tended to regard the Democrats
4 as the party of Catholics, while continued Democrat opposition to the tariff in the wake of the 1857 panic,
5 and Southern opposition to homestead legislation and federal aid for a transcontinental railroad created
6 many Republican voters.
7 Brogan seems to reiterate Foner’s views on Tyler and Calhoun (1993) by arguing that in the 1850s: ‘A
8 new generation of sectional politicians was arising: of men, that is, who lacked a national following. Seward
9 was one; Jefferson Davis . . . another’ (1985/1989: p. 301). As well as these there were men such as John
20111 Brown; and if Stephen Douglas was not a sectional politician, it was certainly his desire to profit from a rail-
1 road and his support of the ‘morally irresponsible’ popular sovereignty and complete underestimation of
2 Northern anti-slavery feeling, which had massive repercussions that included the demise of the Whig Party.
3 In the wake of the 1850 Compromise, Southern ‘fire-eaters’, angered by the admission of California
4 and by various attempts by Northerners to frustrate the operation of the new Fugitive Slave Law, urged
5 secession; but in some Southern states Constitutional Union parties appeared, winning the governorships
6 of Georgia and Mississippi, the legislatures of Georgia and Alabama, and sending a number of congressman
7 to Washington. This seemed to confirm to Northerners that threats of secession were bluff, but McPherson
8 has described Southern unionism as ‘a perishable commodity’(1990: p. 87). It should be noted however
9 that as late as 1860 over half of Southern voters supported pro-Union candidates other than Lincoln.
30 In 1978 Michael Holt moved the debate away from the issue of slavery by arguing that the disintegration
1 of the Whig-Democrat party structure was a major cause of the conflict and that, at other times during the
2 century, the party system and the politicians operating within it managed to contain conflict and to find
3 compromise. He asked why, if the conflict essentially revolved around slavery, all the slave states did not
4 secede and suggested that the causes of sectional differences were not necessarily what caused armed conflict.
5 He looked more to the party system itself rather than individuals, and also argued that distrust of politi-
6 cians had reached an all-time high in the 1850s, with voters completely losing faith in the system amidst
7 a sense of crisis across the whole country – which allowed leaders of Southern states to seize the initiative
8 from prominent national politicians. Southern secession, according to Holt, was not just about rejecting
9 Lincoln but about ‘a belief that the system could not neutralise his threat’ (1978: p. 6). Critics of Holt
40 contended that the second party system (i.e. Democrats/Whigs) could only survive as long as it avoided
1 sectional issues such as slavery. Holt examined at state level parties that had much more of an effect on
2 the everyday lives of people than the ‘flimsy national organisations that came together once every four years
3 to contest the Presidency’ (p. 14) and maintained that it was issues such as prohibitionism and nativism
4 particularly in the North, based on local social tensions, that produced voter realignment in the 1850s rather
45 than national issues such as slavery. To some extent this has been confirmed by others. Holt also asserted
46 that the failure of the Whig-Democratic system to provide a genuine choice for voters meant that they
47 looked elsewhere and that the system broke down out of consensus rather than conflict. There is however
48 an example of slavery/expansion causing a serious rift before the 1850s – in 1848 following the Whig nomin-
49222 ation of Zachary Taylor for the Presidency. This choice of someone who was a hero of the Mexican War
and also a large slave owner prompted the ‘Conscience Whigs’ to leave and create a coalition with the
Liberty Party and anti-slavery (‘Barnburner’) Democrats to form the Free Soil Party. As far back as 1820,
of course, Congress had aligned itself sectionally over the admission of Missouri as a state.
Following the first wave of Southern states to secede, last ditch attempts at compromise in the
Crittenden Plan failed largely because of Lincoln’s refusal to budge, and in that sense, he too must bear a
share of responsibility for the start of the war.
Conclusion
It should be remembered that the causes of secession are not necessarily the same as the causes of the war
itself, but the basis for conflict in the form of slavery had existed since the writing of the Constitution and
the different meanings that Northerners and Southerners took from the American Revolution itself. Future
expansion of the United States threatened to resurrect the slavery issue, and in the 1850s a succession of
events raised tensions to an unprecedented level. It is difficult to get away from the idea that slavery was
at the root of the problems the country faced. Where other factors are cited, they seem inextricably linked
to slavery. If the war was fought for economic reasons then slavery was the key economic difference between
the sections; if it was fought over states’ rights, then the key right, as far as the South was concerned, was
the right to own slaves and take them elsewhere; if the conspiracy theories polarised the sections and
increased alienation then they were theories based on the future of slavery; if agitators stirred up emotions,
they did so using the slavery issue.
Figure 3.4 Campaign banner showing Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin
ESSAYS • 45
1111
Part 2: Essays
2111
3
4111 Expansion and slavery
5
6 1 Explain the reasons behind the 1850 Compromise and assess its consequences. (20)
7 (AQA)
8
9 Ralph Waldo Emerson prophetically announced that: ‘The United States will conquer Mexico, but it will
10111 be as the man who swallows the arsenic which brings him down. Mexico will poison us.’ It can be argued
1 that this is exactly what happened, although the 1850 Compromise inspired by Henry Clay would have
2 caused many to believe that Emerson’s prediction of the country’s demise was premature.
3 The Compromise of 1850 was a direct consequence of the war which the US fought with Mexico
4 between 1846 and 1848, and can be seen as a further attempt to solve the problems created by expansion.
5 The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo signed by the two nations resulted in the US acquiring a vast amount
6 of territory – Mexican land from the Rio Grande to the Pacific, 529,000 square miles to be exact – for
7 $15 million which, once more, raised the question of how the new territory would be organised.
8 Many Northerners had denounced the war as a Southern war intended to expand slavery, and the
9 enthusiasm for war in the South was certainly much stronger than in the North, with the South providing
20111 two-thirds of the volunteers who fought in Mexico. In 1846 and in 1847 the Wilmot Proviso was passed
1 by the House of Representatives in an attempt to bar slavery from land which might be acquired from
2 Mexico, but was defeated in the Senate. Supporters of the bill included anti-slavers and many western
3 Democrats who felt that President James Polk was sacrificing their interests to the South and were furious
4 at his failure to get the whole of Oregon from the British in Canada. Polk had also vetoed bills to use federal
5 funds for improvements to western rivers and harbours. The shift in alignments marked an important step
6 in the agricultural west’s movement away from the plantation South towards the industrial North. Polk
7 regarded the issue of slavery as an abstract one and, like many, felt that New Mexico and California were
8 unsuited to slavery; but others disagreed: cotton was already grown in parts of New Mexico and slaves had
9 worked in mines. The subsequent failure of slavery to take root in these areas however tends to support
30 Polk’s viewpoint, nonetheless the 1850 Compromise was intended to resolve the debate over slavery in
1 those territories.
2 In February 1847, John C. Calhoun introduced into the Senate a series of resolutions known as the
3 Platform of the South, which argued that territories were the common property of all states, and Congress
4 had no right to stop people moving there with their property; in other words no territorial legislature could
5 debar slavery. Popular sovereignty put forward by senator Lewis Cass and taken up by Stephen Douglas
6 appeared to be a middle way, but the 1850 Compromise was to delay the discussion of Calhoun’s argument
7 until the Dred Scott case of 1857.
8 The gains of the war itself contributed to the need for some sort of settlement but it was the prospec-
9 tive admission of California which had seemed far off at the beginning of 1848, yet quickly became imminent
40 with the discovery of gold in that year, which hastened the need for action. The subsequent gold rush which
1 followed meant that California had a population of 100,000 by the end of 1849. The issue of statehood was
2 pressing, and it seemed highly unlikely that California’s constitution would uphold slavery. Other pressures
3 that led to the Compromise included demands for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia,
4 Southern pressure for a more effective Fugitive Slave Law and Texan claims on part of New Mexico.
45 President Taylor wanted California and New Mexico to frame their own constitutions to avoid Congress
46 having to make a decision on slavery. However, by the end of 1849, a secessionist movement had devel-
47 oped in the South, which was especially strong in South Carolina and Mississippi. Taylor, a pro-Northern
48 Southerner, urged the admission of New Mexico and California. The governor of Texas threatened to use
49222 force to uphold the claims of his state to Santa Fe and all the rest of New Mexico east of the Rio Grande,
and a clash with the US army appeared imminent, with Southerners threatening to join the Texans. It was
only Zachary Taylor’s death from acute gastroenteritis on 9 July which broke the deadlock, for the new
President, Millard Fillmore, was a New York Whig who sympathised with the Compromise and the South.
The 1850 Compromise was an attempt to appease both sections. The fact that the original omnibus
bill which had included all measures was defeated and had subsequently to be divided into single bills is a
clear indication of the divisions which some of the issues engendered.
Before assessing the consequences of the Compromise it is necessary first to outline the key measures:
California was admitted as a free state; the south-west area between Texas and California was opened to
popular sovereignty; a new Fugitive Slave Act, which allowed owners to arrest suspected runaways without
a warrant and deny them the rights both to trial by jury and to give evidence on their own behalf; and
heavy fines for anyone helping a slave to escape, with the federal government committing itself to support
the return of runaways.
The 1850 Compromise in many ways failed in much of what it set out to achieve, although it could
be argued that it isolated South Carolina (the only Southern state to actually vote in a convention to secede),
and ensured that secession was delayed by ten years, which may ultimately have saved the Union. There is
an argument that, had the Southern states seceded in 1850, they may well have done it successfully.
James McPherson has argued that California was admitted as a ‘free soil’ state, but in reality the courts
tended to allow the ‘sojourn’ – for up to several years in some cases – of slave owners and slaves, and
although the senators California voted in were Democrats they were ‘dough-faced’ (i.e. tended to sympa-
thise with the South), which meant that the South did not get outvoted in the Senate. Following an 1842
Supreme Court ruling, the recapture of runaway slaves was deemed to be a federal responsibility, and the
‘free soil’ states passed laws to make life difficult for slave owners trying to recover their ‘property’. The
federal government wanted to give the impression that it would do all it could to enforce the new Act of
1850, and almost immediately a number of blacks were seized, provoking fear among black communities
in the North and prompting thousands to flee north to Canada. Others armed themselves, and in September
1851 at the ‘Battle of Christiana’ (in Pennsylvania), a slave owner plus relatives and deputy marshals
attempted to seize two fugitives who had been given refuge by Quakers. More than 20 armed blacks
turned up resulting in the death of the slave owner and wounding of his son. Southerners demanded justice
or they would secede. Fillmore wanted to be seen to act, although following prosecution, charges were
dropped against several whites and blacks. In the meantime, at Syracuse, New York, a group of blacks and
whites broke into a police station and rescued escaped slave William McHenry, who was subsequently
smuggled to Canada. Only one black man was convicted for his part in the action and he died before he
could appeal. Southern ‘fire-eaters’ burned with rage, but cotton prices were the highest they had been in
ten years and the cotton yield was the highest ever, which tempered the calls for secession; and Constitutional
Union Party candidates (a mixture of Democrats and Whigs), who opposed secession, won the governor-
ships of Georgia and Mississippi, control of the legislatures of Georgia and Alabama, and won 14 out
of 19 seats in the House of Representatives from these states. Many Northerners were thereby convinced
that secessionist rhetoric had been mere talk intended to frighten the government into concessions.
But this was a misjudgement for, as James McPherson has put it, ‘Southern unionism . . . was a perishable
commodity’.
The new Fugitive Slave Act was, according to McPherson, the ‘most divisive legacy’ of the Compromise.
In the first 15 months of the new Fugitive Slave Act, 84 escapees were returned to slavery and only
5 released. The case of Margaret Garner who, when about to be captured by government officers in
Ohio, killed her three-year-old child and attempted to kill the other three rather than having to return
to captivity, brought home to many the harsh realities of life as a slave. Murrin suggests that, although
most Northerners were not abolitionists, millions of them, shocked by the spectacle of ‘slave catchers’ on
their streets, moved closer to an anti-slavery stance. Many fugitive slaves kept running when they reached
the North, and did not stop until they reached Canada. By 1852 the number of runaways being returned
South had dropped by a third since the first year of the law’s operation.
ESSAYS • 47
1111 There were, however, attempts made in the North to reassure the South, with Indiana and Iowa actually
2111 passing laws preventing the immigration of any blacks at all, but the most notorious incident had yet to
3 come. In 1854, escaped slave Anthony Burns was arrested in Boston where abolitionists tried to release him
4111 – resulting in the death of a deputy marshal. President Pierce pulled out all the stops, spent over $100,000
5 (roughly $2 million today) and brought in troops to ensure Burns was returned to Virginia. Textile magnate
6 Amos Lawrence said: ‘we went to bed one night old fashioned, conservative, Compromise Union Whigs
7 and waked up stark mad Abolitionists.’ Not surprisingly Maldwyn Jones has described the Fugitive Slave
8 Law as a ‘hollow victory for the South’ as it proved so difficult to enforce, while very few slaves were taken
9 into New Mexico and Utah, which in reality made it unlikely that when it came to a vote the two areas
10111 would become slave states.
1
2 2 Outline the ‘states’ rights’ versus ‘federal rights’ argument in the build-up to the war
3 and assess the extent to which slavery was the most important states’ right for
4 Southerners? (20)
5 (AQA)
6
7 From the time that the Founding Fathers sat down together in Philadelphia to draft a constitution, one of
8 the burning issues which had to be resolved was where power would lie. Many of the so-called Anti-
9 Federalists who opposed the ratification of the Constitution argued that too much power had been given
20111 to the federal government at the expense of the states, which of course already had their own legislative
1 assemblies and forms of government. Some Southerners argued that any Congressional law passed affecting
2
trade would have to receive a two-thirds majority vote out of suspicion that the North would attempt to
3
use Congress to its own economic advantage. Others lobbied so that the 10th Amendment would ensure
4
that any powers not granted to the federal government in the Constitution would belong to the states.
5
Clearly a compromise was reached, but the issue refused to go away in subsequent years.
6
In 1828 supporters of the Democrat Presidential candidate Andrew Jackson attempted to embarrass
7
President John Quincy Adams who wanted a high tariff put on imports to stimulate Northern industry.
8
Southerners resented having to pay more for their goods to subsidise Yankee businesses, and feared foreign
9
retaliation against their cotton exports, the price of cotton in South Carolina having been low for some
30
years. Jackson’s supporters decided to support a high tariff on foreign manufactured goods in exchange for
1
2 heavy rates on wool and flax which Northern mill owners needed, in the hope that North and South would
3 combine to defeat the President. The flax- and wool-producing West however supported protection for its
4 raw materials, and the North, although begrudgingly, was prepared to pay higher prices to maintain
5 its virtual monopoly on manufactured goods. In the South, the new tariff was called the Tariff of Abomina-
6 tions. Vice-President Calhoun anonymously issued the South Carolina Exposition, which declared the
7 Southern states had the right to declare a federal law void within their borders if they thought it uncon-
8 stitutional. This ‘nullification doctrine’ (which had been proposed as early as 1798 by Thomas Jefferson in
9 response to the Alien and Sedition Acts) was refuted by senator Daniel Webster who argued that the
40 Constitution was not a compact between states but one between the people, and only the Supreme Court
1 had the power to interpret it.
2 In 1832 a new tariff act reduced duties, but not by enough for South Carolina. Given that only months
3 earlier the Nat Turner slave revolt in Virginia had resulted in the slaughter of many whites, that the North’s
4 population had been rising much faster than the South’s, and that with abolitionism also gaining ground,
45 the South felt threatened. Calhoun resigned the Vice-Presidency to fight for Southern rights in the Senate,
46 and South Carolina called a convention, which declared the two tariff acts null and void and threatened
47 to secede if the federal government tried to enforce them. Jackson promised he would personally invade
48 South Carolina if necessary with the result that the state then recruited an army. Finally, Clay and Calhoun
49222 created a compromise to reduce tariffs over nine years.
Sectional Southern voting, bolstered by at least a half of the Northern Democrats, usually defeated
attempts to raise tariffs, pass land grant measures (including a Homestead Act, which might open up
the West to free soilers from the North and a Pacific Railroad Act), and award grants to states to set up
agricultural and mechanical colleges. Defeating these measures may have helped economic problems, but
in the 1850s the measures were perceived by Southerners as being particularly in Northern interests, and
even when the Land College Grant and Homestead Acts were passed, Buchanan vetoed them. It could
therefore be argued that it was actually self-interest which motivated Southern action, rather than any
greater affinity for states’ rights, especially as Southerners had rarely invoked the states’ rights argument
when there was a balance between free states and slave states in Congress, and they had dominated the
Presidency and Supreme Court. It could in fact be argued that it was the prospect of being a permanent
minority in a Union that had outlawed the expansion of slavery which gave rise to the states’ rights
cause, because, ironically, the Supreme Court’s decision over Dred Scott, which was widely supported in
the South, was an implied attack on the rights of states to determine whether or not slavery existed within
their borders.
The North certainly seemed to identify more with the institutions of the Union, but again it can
be contended that this was also born of self-interest, and that issues such as the Tariff, the Homestead Act
and government aid for improvements were simply measures that the North wanted for its own benefit.
Post-war claims by Jefferson Davis that states’ rights had been the main cause of the South’s secession
have been treated sceptically by many historians, but there is no doubt that one of the consequences of
war was the increase of central power over the states. Davis, in retrospect, may well have been attempting
to make the Southern cause seem more noble than it had been, but it can be argued that as far as Southerners
were concerned the state right of prime importance was that of slavery.
As early as the 1820s John Calhoun had laid down the principle that the states had the right to nullify
federal laws, but the issue which had prompted Calhoun to set out such an argument was that of the tariff,
not slavery, and it was the tariff which in many ways was more of an issue until the 1850s, when ‘Bleeding
Kansas’ played its fatal part in the polarisation of the sections.
When South Carolina declared the reasons for its secession it argued that the Republicans would wage
a war on slavery until it was abolished, at which point the equal rights of the states would be lost and the
federal government would have become the enemy of the Southern states. The significance of this is that
it was not the tariff, nor land grants, named as the key issue, but slavery. Alexander Stephens, Vice-President
of the Confederacy, argued that slavery just happened to be the issue over which supporters of states’
rights and those who favoured a stronger central government clashed, but it was more fundamental than
that. Had slavery not existed in the South before the 1860s, it is extremely difficult to imagine any war
taking place. Slavery was what defined the South and that is what made it the most important state right.
Debate over tariff levels had brought dissent in earlier years, but even that issue was related to slavery in
the sense that the South’s economy was more dependent on exports than the North’s, and therefore the
South feared the possibility that countries such as Britain would retaliate against high US tariffs by raising
the duty on commodities such as cotton. The fact that the North was a more economically diverse
and industrialising region than the South was also inextricably linked to slavery and a reliance on labour-
intensive agricultural production in the South. Even opposition to homestead grants seemed to be based
on the premise that the beneficiaries of the grants were more likely to come from the more populous
free states, which would in turn ensure that the territories where they settled would have a majority of
inhabitants who voted against slavery when it came to applying for statehood. In the light of these consid-
erations, it would appear that slavery must be judged the most important states’ right as far as Southerners
were concerned.
ESSAYS • 49
1111 3 How far was Southern nationalism the product of Northern attacks on slavery and to
2111 what extent were sectional differences responsible for the outbreak of war? (20)
3 (AQA)
4111
5 It is probably fair to say that Southern nationalism or a distinct Southern consciousness did not really begin
6 to emerge until the 1840s. Up until then all of the things which the two sections had in common seemed
7 more significant, for example the same language, legal system and religious views. The year 1831 was in
8 many ways significant, given that the Nat Turner slave revolt took place in Virginia, and William Lloyd
9 Garrison published the first issue of his abolitionist paper The Liberator. The Nullification Crisis of 1832
10111 saw South Carolina threatening to secede over a high tariff. Other Southern states were not prepared to go
1 as far, but the appearance of the Free Soil Party, which won 14 per cent of the Northern vote in 1848, was
2 a further cause for alarm as far as Southerners were concerned, because it marked the conspicuous entry
3 into national politics of an issue which had hitherto only been an issue for abolitionist pressure groups
4 to champion.
5 In the debates surrounding the 1850 Compromise, Seward ominously spoke of a ‘higher law than the
6 Constitution’ in his attacks on slavery and the government quickly attempted to disclaim his speech, but
7 he spoke for many in the North who were becoming convinced of the immorality of slavery. Attempts to
8 enforce the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law, with notorious examples such as the Anthony Burns case, had enraged
9 elements in the North and the subsequent resistance had in turn enraged the South. In the late spring of
20111
1852 Uncle Tom’s Cabin was published as a book, and sold 300,000 copies within a year in the US alone
1
(the equivalent of about three million copies today). Within a decade it had sold two million in the US.
2
The author of the book, Harriet Beecher Stowe, had based the novel on what she had seen of slavery in
3
Kentucky, her brother’s experiences working in New Orleans and accounts from runaway slaves; some
4
Northerners, and not all Southerners, were portrayed in a bad light, but the South was appalled by the
5
book, perhaps because of the truths it contained. Lincoln, upon meeting Stowe in 1862, apparently remarked
6
to her: ‘So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war.’
7
During the 1850s, Frederick Law Olmstead, a Northern journalist, travelled through the South, and in
8
three books argued that the institution of slavery had helped to create a society that lacked resourcefulness
9
or economic initiative. It could be argued that, given the price of cotton, the South did not need to diver-
30
1 sify as the North had. Historians differ over the extent to which investment in other areas such as railroads
2 and mills would have made more profit, and there is also evidence to suggest that parts of the South had
3 begun to industrialise. A further literary assault on the South appeared in 1857 with Hinton Rowan Helper’s
4 book called The Impending Crisis of the South, which portrayed the region as economically backward, with
5 widespread illiteracy and poverty. The book made a huge impact in the North and Republicans distributed
6 an abridged version of it during election campaigns.
7 By this time the South had become more assertive in its justifications of slavery and George Fitzhugh’s
8 Cannibals All in 1857 argued that the South was superior to the North, describing free labour under capital-
9 ism in the North as a sort of ‘social cannibalism’ in a society where the strong oppressed the weak.
40 Historian Ed Beares has argued that John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry was the single most important
1 cause of the war in the sense that the Southern militia system was immediately improved as a result,
2 increasing the possibility of conflict. The wave of sympathy engendered in the North by Brown’s eloquent
3 defence of himself and his subsequent execution – church bells were rung on the day of his death and
4 there were rumours that prominent Republicans had given covert support to Brown – convinced the South
45 that slavery could not be protected in the Union. Brown’s raid was clearly a short-term cause of the war,
46 and it should be remembered that it was Lincoln’s election which triggered secession, but there can be
47 little doubt that Southern nationalism emerged as a response to perceived threats from the North. Fatally,
48 it was to give many Southerners a false impression of their own abilities and the confidence to leave
49222 the Union.
The crucial issue here is to decide whether conflict caused sectional differences or vice versa. It is true
to say that votes on the 1850 Compromise divided essentially along sectional rather than party lines, as had
votes on other issues such as the tariff and land grants, which suggests that sectional differences existed
before 1860. The fact that they had existed before 1860 however raises the question of why war did not
break out prior to 1860.
Holt blames the breakdown of the party system for the failure to contain the issue of slavery, and
yet there had always been a possibility that at some point the party system would be unable to contain an
issue so potentially explosive. In December 1860, Lincoln suggested that views on slavery marked the only
substantial difference between North and South, but there is evidence which might suggest otherwise.
McPherson has argued that of the 143 important inventions patented between 1790 and 1860, 93 per cent
came from the free states. Southern cotton accounted for something like 75 per cent of the world’s supply,
and the South provided 60 per cent of all American imports. Between 1800 and 1860 the percentage of the
North’s labour force working in agriculture dropped from 70 per cent to 40 per cent yet the Southern
proportion remained constant at 80 per cent. Approximately 25 per cent of Northerners lived in urban
areas, compared to just 10 per cent of Southerners, while 88 per cent of immigrants settled in the free
states. There is also a view that Southerners tended to take the view that ‘trade’ was beneath a Southern
gentleman. North and South tended to react in a sectional way towards the Tariff and Homestead Acts,
having a Bank of the United States and improvement grants. Although these were not entirely sectional
issues, given that Northern Democrats usually voted with the South against them, nonetheless they formed
part of the sectional differences of importance that existed before the war.
In recent years, historians have come to take the view that sectional differences have been exaggerated.
Brian Holden Reid concurs that slavery was ‘central to the sense of cultural divergence between the North
and South, even if this has been exaggerated’. It is, however, one thing for historians to look back in a
detached way at events when what is important is what people thought at the time, and perceived sectional
differences certainly gave impetus to the rival conspiracy theories, which in turn increased perceptions of
sectional differences. The movement to reopen the African slave trade in the late 1850s; attempts to annex
Cuba (1850 and 1851) with Southern volunteers, which had the tacit acknowledgement of the government
(Pierce was determined to get Cuba but Spain would not sell); talk of seizing other islands and some parts
of Mexico; the 1854 Gadsden Purchase from Mexico; and filibuster (freebooter or pirate) William Walker’s
expedition to Nicaragua in 1855, which raised Southern hopes for plantations in the area, all contributed
to the sense that the South had different values.
It is reasonable to take the view that there were long-term, medium-term and short-term causes of the
war. The long-term causes can be seen as expansion, the issue of slavery, economic differences between the
sections, and states’ rights; the medium-term causes include the rise of abolitionism, the emergence of rival
conspiracy theories, and an exaggerated perception of regional differences; and the short-term causes include
the individual roles of key people, issues such as Kansas-Nebraska, the Dred Scott case, John Brown’s raid,
Lincoln’s election, and secession. Utilising this perspective, it is possible to argue that sectional differences
were not as important as some of the long-term factors. But this ignores the fact that slavery was the most
important sectional difference, and was what gave rise to other perceptions of diversity.
Edward Ranson and Andrew Hook are sceptical about an Old South of aristocratic and chivalrous
planters in white mansions, elegant women and slaves singing in cotton fields, and trace this romanticised
version of life to the 1830s and 1840s. They suggest that the South deliberately tried to create a distinct
identity for itself, and point to the drawing of the Mason-Dixon line between Maryland and Pennsylvania
in the 1760s to settle a boundary dispute, when nobody took the view that people north of it were in any
way different from the people who happened to be living south of it. In reality the South was geographi-
cally diverse and consisted of ‘many Souths’, while its language, laws, religion and culture were hardly any
different from those of the rest of the country, although from the 1830s Southerners decided to stop apol-
ogising for slavery and instead argued its merits. It is certainly possible to argue, as Paludan has suggested,
that the North identified more closely with the country’s democratic institutions.
ESSAYS • 51
1111
2111 Irresponsible agitators and blundering politicians
3
4111 4 To what extent was James Buchanan responsible for the outbreak of war
5 in 1861? (20)
6 (AQA)
7
8 In a recent survey of American History professors, Buchanan was voted the worst of all the men to have
9 held the office of President. Paul Finkelman has claimed that his policies directly and indirectly encour-
10111 aged and aided secession, although others have maintained that he could have done little to prevent secession
1 given the circumstances and issues that arose.
2 Buchanan’s victory in 1856 was sectional. He was the first President since John Quincy Adams not to
3 win a majority of both Northern and Southern states. At the time of his election he was 65 and had been
4 out of the country for three years, which left him out of touch and unable to understand the depth of
5 Northern opposition to the expansion of slavery. Douglas, who had not been out of the country, also misun-
6 derstood the depth of Northern feeling. Buchanan however did not help the situation and right from the
7 start of his Presidency he made some serious mistakes. Four of his cabinet were slaveholding Southerners,
8 two others were pro-South and one member was against the anti-slavery movement. He valued the advice
9 of personal friends above that of skilled politicians, and, most significantly, he did not choose Douglas,
20111 the most popular Democrat in the North, to be in his cabinet. The advisers to whom he listened outside
1 his cabinet also tended to be slave owners.
2 Some have argued that Buchanan was the ultimate ‘dough-face’ (i.e. a Northerner with Southern beliefs)
3 and he certainly saw nothing immoral in slavery. He appointed Robert Walker as governor of Kansas, who
4 informed him that, despite a minority of settlers being pro-slavery, as a result of fraudulent elections a
5 majority of the Lecompton legislature was pro-slavery. At first Buchanan backed Walker, and in the process
6 undermined criticism of Dred Scott and the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Finkelman argues he could have brought
7 Kansas in as a Democrat-supporting free state and perhaps ended the debate over slavery in the territories,
8 but he failed to give Walker the support he needed. Walker resigned, and Buchanan refused to insist the
9 pro-slavery Lecompton Constitution be put to a fair vote. This further convinced Northerners of a sectional
30 conspiracy reaching the highest office.
1 David Potter noted that, by trying to bring Kansas in as a slave state, Buchanan failed to see how badly
2 the Northern wing of the Democrat Party would be damaged, and what an awkward position it would put
3 Northern Democrat congressmen in. Anti-slavery Republicans voted with Douglas and his Democratic
4 allies. The House’s vote against the admission of Kansas was a major loss for Buchanan’s party and
5 Presidency according to Finkelman. Buchanan persuaded Congress to pass the English Bill, which declared
6 that if the people of Kansas voted for the Lecompton Constitution they would receive immediate state-
7 hood and 19 million acres of public lands; if they rejected it (which they did), Kansas would not be admitted
8 until it had 90,000 settlers. The people of Kansas effectively voted to wait.
9 Had Buchanan managed to resolve Kansas, Stampp argues that the Republicans would have had
40 no major issue on which to campaign. But they did have other issues and one of those was the corruption
1 of Buchanan’s administration: there was evidence in a Congressional report that the government had bribed
2 congressmen to vote for the admission of Kansas under the Lecompton Constitution, as well as bribing
3 judges to naturalise immigrants prematurely so they could vote in the crucial states of Pennsylvania and
4 Indiana to help swing those states to Buchanan. Buchanan also tried to unseat Douglas through patronage
45 and threats, but failed, and the Republicans won 109 seats in 1858 in the House of Representatives. The
46 Republicans managed to exploit splits among the Democrat and Whig /‘Know-Nothing’ representatives and
47 elect a Republican speaker, despite not having a majority in the House.
48 Within days of Buchanan’s inauguration the long-awaited verdict of the Dred Scott case was
49222 announced. Chief Justice Roger Taney declared in March 1857 that Congress did not have the power to
ban slavery from the territories. The fact that Buchanan had been informed of the Court’s decision before
it was announced contributed to the mistrust felt by many and confirmed the fears of those who believed
in a ‘slaveholders’ conspiracy’. It also appears that Buchanan put a lot of improper pressure on Grier, one
of the Northern Supreme Court judges, to support Taney’s decision in order to avoid accusations of a
sectional ruling. Buchanan’s designs on Cuba and his tendency to turn a blind eye to the attempts by
Southern filibusters to expand slavery by conquest (some say he even tacitly encouraged it) only served
to increase the mistrust.
Buchanan’s response to the economic panic that started in August 1857 following the collapse of many
banks, was to tighten the money supply – exactly when more money was needed. Northerners blamed
the panic on a low tariff and the blocking of a transcontinental railroad, internal improvements and the
Homestead Bill. It is difficult to determine accurately the part each played but Buchanan’s position on
money and hostility to a national banking system showed a lack of leadership, and further alienated
Northern support.
In 1860 some felt that support for Breckinridge would throw the election open to a decision of the
House, where each state would have one vote for the top two electoral college candidates, believing Bell
and Lincoln would split the North – which, in the event, Lincoln carried. By the time Buchanan had left
office seven Southern states had seceded. He blamed Northern agitators and threats to slavery, and although
he acknowledged secession as illegal he did nothing to prevent it.
Buchanan may not have been able to prevent war in the long term, but he clearly played a major role
in the timing of the war, as did others who inhabited the White House. In the words of Finkelman: ‘The
blundering generation of Presidents from Fillmore to Buchanan set the stage for the war.’
Stampp sees the events of 1857 as crucial in preventing a peaceful solution, and blames Buchanan for
pursuing policies that alienated Northerners. Nevins called Buchanan’s actions in 1857–8 ‘one of the signifi-
cant failures of American statesmanship’.
PRACTICE QUESTION
5 How far were ‘irresponsible agitators and blundering politicians’ to blame for the
outbreak of the American Civil War? (20)
(AQA)
Advice: The main focus of this answer should obviously be the role of individuals in the build-up to war. It is
good form to start with individuals rather than examining longer-term causes first. You can always cover other
factors later on in the essay. Men such as James Buchanan, Stephen Douglas, John Brown and Abraham Lincoln
might all figure in your answer, and if you can write relevantly about the historiography, all well and good.
A useful conclusion to the answer might be to consider whether you think the war would have broken out
eventually, regardless of the individuals who played such a major role in the 1850s.
Motives for secession and fighting
6 How much truth was there in the Southern belief that a black republican conspiracy to
abolish slavery existed and to what extent was the North responsible for the outbreak of
Civil War? (20)
(AQA)
There was certainly opposition to slavery in the North. Particularly since the 1830s, abolitionists had
mounted a consistent campaign against the evils of slavery from a moral standpoint. In the 1840s, many
ESSAYS • 53
1111 Northern states blocked the recapture of runaway slaves, and in 1852 Uncle Tom’s Cabin was very well
2111 received in the North. In the North, some objected to slavery because it represented unfair competition to
3 the ‘free labour’ system outside the South; others were indifferent to the rights and wrongs of slavery
4111 as long as conflict could be avoided. But, step by step, a belief in the South took hold that there existed
5 an organised conspiracy in the North, bent on the overthrow of slavery. And once that had taken hold,
6 every little bit of evidence seemed to confirm its existence, just as many Northerners came to believe
7 in a slaveholders’ conspiracy to extend slavery, destroy civil liberties and take control of the federal
8 government.
9 Although from the South, Chief Justice Taney had released his own slaves. Nonetheless, he felt that
10111 Southerners were under threat from the North, and wrote in a private letter ‘the knife of the assassin is at
1 their throats’. Whatever Taney’s motives, the Dred Scott decision helped to strengthen the Republican Party,
2 and gave ammunition to Seward and Lincoln to accuse Buchanan and Taney of collusion, which seemed
3 to provide further evidence of a ‘slave power’ conspiracy.
4 The sympathetic reaction in the North to John Brown’s execution seemed to provide further evidence
5 of Northern collusion, and some Southerners even contested that the backing for the raid came from
6 members of the Republican Party itself. Expressions of horror at Brown’s raid from prominent Republicans
7 such as Lincoln cut little ice in the South, and his subsequent Presidential victory on a sectional Northern
8 vote said it all as far as Southerners were concerned. What more evidence could anyone want?
9 To a certain extent it is possible to sympathise with the South in the sense that the institution of slavery
20111
was clearly under threat, if not in the short term then certainly in the long term. Lincoln had stated that
1
he expected the Union to become all slaveholding or all free, and there were no prizes for guessing which
2
option he thought would happen. Most Northerners were certainly opposed to the expansion of slavery,
3
be it on economic or moral grounds, but it was precisely the different motives for opposing the expansion
4
of slavery and the varying attitudes towards interfering with slavery where it already existed that meant that
5
in reality no Republican conspiracy existed.
6
Brian Holden Reid appears to have no doubt that the South was the aggressive party and solely to
7
blame for the conflict, blaming the secessionists’ casual attitude to, and over-reliance on force, with the
8
South deluding itself that a war for independence could be easily won with foreign help and a little violence.
9
30 In January 1831 the first issue of William Lloyd Garrison’s abolitionist paper, The Liberator, came off
1 the presses; and, within months, 60 whites had been killed in Virginia in the Nat Turner revolt. Ranson
2 and Hook have argued that: ‘these two events electrified the South, and they did much to ensure that the
3 spirit of sectional unity would continue to grow.’ In other words, there was a perception that the revolt
4 was linked to the rise of abolitionism in the North. They argue further that, until the 1830s, Southern
5 spokesmen tended to apologise for slavery as a necessary evil, but as a result of abolitionist pressure
6 Southerners became more assertive, arguing that slavery beat ‘wage slavery’ in the North, and blacks were
7 inferior, citing numerous historical precedents.
8 In 1832, Garrison established the New England Anti-Slavery Society, and in 1833 the American Anti-
9 Slavery Society was set up, having nearly 200,000 members by 1840. The Liberty Party stood at the 1840
40 elections but never campaigned for the outright abolition of slavery, wanting mainly to keep slavery out of
1 the territories. In Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842) the Supreme Court ruled that states did not have to help
2 enforce the 1793 Fugitive Slave Law, and several Northern states passed personal liberty laws forbidding
3 state officials from helping aid the return of runaways.
4 Foner said that the emergence of militant abolitionism, Nat Turner’s rebellion, the Virginia debates
45 on slavery, and the Nullification Crisis, presented attacks to slavery from within and outside the South.
46 In response Southern society closed ranks in defence of slavery. It should be noted that the events within
47 the South were also partly influenced by those outside it. Given the growth of pro-slavery arguments
48 in the South in the 1830s and the Congressional Gag Rule, plus mob attacks on abolitionist printing presses,
49222 abolitionists could argue that, besides being morally wrong, slavery was incompatible with democratic values
and concepts of freedom. In the South, the ‘internal dynamic’ of claim and counter-claim was exacerbated
by agitators seeking to exploit sectional conflict for personal gain. Foner has pointed to John Tyler and
John Calhoun, two of the so-called agitators, as political outsiders whose careers had been blocked by the
major parties.
In 1852, Uncle Tom’s Cabin shook the nation, and attitudes in both North and South were perhaps
never quite the same again after its publication. Foner also points to the development of Republican ideology
based on such areas as ‘free labour’, enterprise, glorifying the self-made man and materialism, and defined
the South as backward and stagnant. The Whig Party had been regarded by many as the party of wealth
and privilege, and the perpetuation of the ‘slave power’ conspiracy, described by Foner as ‘the ideological
glue of the Republican party’, allowed the Republicans to portray themselves as anti-aristocratic. A strong
argument can also be constructed for the North wanting to fight for economic reasons.
When the states of the Lower South decided to secede, the North could have chosen to let them go,
and, in that sense, it was the North’s decision to fight. Having said that, it could be argued that Southerners
should have realised there was a good chance that the North would fight, although it is not entirely certain
that they did, nor is it necessarily clear why Northerners valued the Union so highly, they were prepared
to lay down their lives in vast numbers to preserve it. Stampp also argued that politicians and people
in the South made a series of ‘horrendous blunders’ during 1860 and 1861, embarking ‘irrationally and
irresponsibly’ on a war which was always likely to be disastrous.
7 ‘Economic issues were at the root of the problems which led to Civil War.’
Discuss. (20)
(AQA)
Essay plan
Introduction: Indicate a line of argument showing that in some way economic causes could be at the
root of problems, given that slavery can be viewed as an economic issue; or offer a broad outline
of the economic issues which need to be examined, as well as other causes which should be
considered.
Para 1: Marxist/Revisionist view of war as feudal South v. capitalist North, e.g. Charles Beard, and
the arguments that this is oversimplistic, given the diversity of Republican supporters and other
factors.
Para 2: Slavery as an economic issue to link into next para.
Para 3: Detail differences between North and South, particularly the tariff question, and other perceived
differences linked to the economy.
Para 4: Examine how far the North depended on the South economically and whether the South over-
estimated its ability to survive economically in the long term.
Para 5: Discuss how far economic factors may have been exaggerated.
Paras 6/7: Assess the extent to which other factors played a part in the coming of war, such as slavery as
a moral issue, individuals, sectional conspiracies, etc.
Conclusion: How far did economic issues in their own right cause the war, and how far did they link to
other causes of the war?
ESSAYS • 55
1111 8 How far did the breakdown of the Democrat/Whig Party system in the 1850s precipitate
2111 the outbreak of war? (20)
3 (AQA)
4111
5
6 Essay plan
7 Introduction: A comment regarding the views of Michael Holt put forward in the 1970s.
8
9 Para 1: Further discussion of Holt’s views related to the breakdown of the party system, and the counter
10111 theory that it was the issue of slavery that caused the breakdown.
1 Para 2: Assessment of the party system, and what the parties stood for.
2
3 Para 3: Examine why the Democrat/Whig system had been able to keep sectional animosity at bay for so
4 long.
5 Para 4: Look at the impact of ‘Know-Nothingism’ and what caused the break-up of the Whigs, and also
6 what the emergent Republican Party stood for.
7
8 Para 5: Examine other issues that contributed to war in the 1850s, e.g. Bleeding Kansas, Dred Scott and
9 John Brown’s raid.
20111 Para 6: Assess the extent to which the creation of the Republican Party and Lincoln becoming President
1 made war inevitable.
2
3 Para 6: Examine other factors that contributed to war and the views of historians who reject Holt’s theory.
4 Conclusion: The role the breakdown of the Democrat/Whig system played, and how far the new Republican
5 Party increased tensions in the build-up to war.
6
7
8
9 9 Why did the Southern states secede from the Union and to what extent did secession
30 make Civil War an inevitability? (20)
1 (AQA)
2
3 The declarations of the causes of secession issued by the Southern states indicate that their prime reason
4 for leaving the Union was to protect the institution of slavery.
5 Brian Holden Reid views the movement towards secession in a slightly wider context, maintaining that
6 it was a reaction against a system that had allowed a sectional President, who was seen as a threat to the
7 South, especially with regard to slavery, to come to power. Reid believes that an independent Confederacy
8 would have attempted to extend its influence over the whole of the Caribbean basin, even if it may not
9 have actively tried to expand slavery. The argument that the South fought to defend its own way of life,
40 which essentially revolved around slave labour, believing that it could succeed economically without the
1 North, and that it adopted secession as a sort of ‘plan B’, in the sense that other attempts to safeguard their
2 demands had failed, suggests that secession was the work of a highly provincial, possibly insubstantial,
3 excitable minority. David Potter also adheres to the idea that a secessionist minority, which seems to have
4 been strong in the plantation districts, determinedly exploited discontent and confusion to achieve their
45 own ends.
46 There was certainly a perception among Southerners that they would be better off without the North.
47 An Alabama newspaper said of the Southerner: ‘In Northern vessels his products are carried to market,
48 his cotton is ginned with Northern gins, his sugar is crushed and preserved with Northern machinery, his
49222 rivers are navigated by Northern steamboats.’ It has been estimated that some 15–20 per cent of the price
of raw cotton went outside the South to Northern or British creditors, insurers, and shipping and ware-
housing, and there was a strong sense that the North depended heavily on the South. The ‘Panic’ of 1857
which affected the South relatively lightly seemed to confirm to many Southerners that the North was
weaker economically, but in the long term, of course, its diversity proved to be a greater strength.
Holt has argued that Southern conservatives who were against secession were poorly organised and
often portrayed as unpatriotic, which tended to make them cautious of voicing their doubts. ‘Immediatists’
had won the day against ‘Co-operationists’ across the South, despite the fact that the Republicans did not
control either House in Congress. He also argued that Southerners had lost faith in their congressmen by
1860, and local politicians rather than national figures took the lead in the secessionist movement. Whatever
the motives behind secession there appears to have been a belief in the South that the North would not
fight a war to preserve the Union.
Allowing the precedent of secession would mean that, at any point in the future when a state felt its
interests no longer coincided with those of the other states in the Union, it could secede. Potentially this
could mean the complete disintegration of the Union or a return to a loose confederation of states such
as had existed under the Articles of Confederation. The Southern states which formed the Confederacy do
not seem to have worried unduly that the Confederacy might in turn disintegrate itself, and the internal
bickering which dogged the Southern war effort at times could well have ultimately manifested itself in a
break-up of the Confederacy.
Southerners also tended to feel that if Northerners did want to fight they would quickly lose owing to
superior military leadership and prowess in the South. There is evidence to suggest that there was some-
thing of an inferiority complex in the North regarding Southern military ability, but this was not sufficiently
strong to convince Northerners that a war could not be won, even given the problems of effectively having
to invade the South and subdue it to win. It is easy with hindsight to assume that the North would win
any war, but that was far from clear at the time, and the decision to fight was not one taken lightly by
Lincoln and his cabinet. There were major worries over the position of the border states as well as that of
the Upper South.
There seems little doubt that just as Northerners had assumed Southerners would never actually secede
en masse, so Southerners believed that the North would not actually try to prevent secession. Northern
affinity for the Union and what it stood for was severely underestimated by the South; and from a Northern
viewpoint secession had to be stopped. Slavery may have been the main issue which led to Southern seces-
sion, but the North did not initially go to war to abolish slavery.
10 How far was Abraham Lincoln responsible for the failure to find compromise in
1860–1? (20)
(AQA)
Lincoln’s selection as Presidential candidate for the 1860 election over the more outspoken Seward was
calculated to win over support of the ‘Know-Nothings’ and give the Republicans a better chance of winning
Illinois, which was Lincoln’s home state. Lincoln’s victory in 1860 triggered the secession of South Carolina,
which was soon followed by the other states from the Lower South.
Nevins and Potter have both argued that, as a party, the Republicans had refused to take warnings of
secession seriously, which was a significant mistake, but secession had already happened by the time Lincoln
took office. There was a tendency in the North to believe in a repressed Unionist majority in the South,
which would at some point assert itself, but, as McPherson has argued, Southern Unionism was a ‘perishable
commodity’.
The seven three-hour Lincoln–Douglas debates during the election campaign for the Senate in Illinois,
which centred on slavery, did allow Douglas to point out inconsistencies in Lincoln’s stance, asking why
the country could not endure half slave/half free, and highlighted the fact that Lincoln certainly did not
ESSAYS • 57
1111 believe in black equality with whites. If Lincoln had no intention of interfering in states where slavery
2111 already existed how did he expect to bring slavery to its ultimate extinction?
3 The best known of the attempts to create a last minute compromise came in the form of the Crittenden
4111 Plan, put together by a Senate ‘Committee of Thirteen’ which included Seward, Wade, Douglas, Jefferson
5 Davis and John J. Crittenden (a slave-owning supporter of the Union). It proposed to guarantee slavery
6 perpetually against future interference by the federal government and to prohibit slavery in all the territo-
7 ries north of the Missouri Compromise line (there was a precedent for an amendment that could not be
8 overridden in Article V, which prohibits change in Senate representation); and federal compensation was
9 to be paid to slave owners who failed to recover slaves under the Fugitive Slave Act, but Lincoln’s opposi-
10111 tion proved to be crucial. He was happy to accept compensation for slave owners and to guarantee slavery
1 but he remained opposed to its extension. In December 1860, Congress, which no longer contained
2 members from the Lower South, defeated the plan 25 to 23 in the Senate and 113 to 180 in the Representa-
3 tives. A further convention, which met in Washington in February 1861 at the behest of Virginia, and
4 produced only slight modifications of Crittenden’s proposals, failed to win the interest of Congress.
5 Lincoln was resolved to preserve the Union when he assumed the Presidency in 1861. One has to
6 wonder how possible compromise was, given that the Southern states wanted to be out of the Union and
7 the Northern states wanted them to remain. By 1861 the Southern states seemed convinced that slavery
8 was no longer safe in the Union. The only way in which Lincoln could have persuaded the Confederate
9 states to come back would have been to renounce the pledge made in his election campaign to prevent the
20111 further expansion of slavery. Had he guessed a war would result in the deaths of over 600,000 people, he
1 may have been more inclined to do just that.
2 Lincoln knew that if he relieved militarily the federal garrison at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor,
3 under the command of Major Robert Anderson, he would be blamed for starting the war and could pro-
4 voke the Upper South into secession. If he ordered Anderson to withdraw, as South Carolina wanted,
5 it could divide Northern opinion and potentially his cabinet. He decided to stall. Seward advised him to
6 give up Sumter, which would reduce the chances of the Upper South seceding and encourage Unionism
7 in the South. General Winfield Scott assured Lincoln that reinforcing Sumter would be impossible.
8 Only one person in Lincoln’s cabinet, Montgomery Blair, advised Lincoln to hold Sumter regardless of the
9 risk, but Lincoln agreed. Seward had leaked to the press that Sumter would be given up and the wave of
30 public opposition that swept the North convinced Lincoln to stick to his guns. He won the cabinet over
1 to the idea of resupplying Sumter – a calculated move which left the ball in the court of the Confederacy,
2 where Jefferson Davis was under pressure to attack Sumter before enthusiasm for secession waned and to
3 force the Upper South to make a choice.
4 Lincoln caused the war in the sense that he decided the South would not be allowed to secede, and
5 he was prepared to use force of arms to ensure that they were brought back into the Union. Whether the
6 South could realistically have expected the North to let it leave is open to debate. There is certainly evidence
7 to suggest that many Southerners did not think the North would fight. Brian Holden Reid argued that the
8 decision to fire on Fort Sumter was taken by overconfident Southerners who believed the North could
9 be intimidated into meekly accepting secession, but Lincoln was made of sterner stuff.
40
1
PRACTICE QUESTION
2
3 11 Why did the American Civil War not break out earlier than 1861? (20)
4 (AQA)
45
46 Advice: The answer to this question should probably concentrate on: the various compromises, such as that of
47 1850, which had effectively averted war, and the men who created them; the common ground shared by North
48 and South; and the short-term triggers of war which occurred in the 1850s, such as the collapse of the Whig
49222 Party, Bleeding Kansas and John Brown’s raid.
Part 3: Sources
1 Understanding the Northern perspective
■ Source A: ‘The True Remedy for the Fugitive Slave Bill’, editorial from Frederick Douglass’s
paper, 9 June 1854
A good revolver, a steady hand, and a determination to shoot down any man attempting to kidnap. Let
every colored man make up his mind to this, and live by it, and if needs be, die by it. This will put an end
to kidnapping and to slaveholding, too.
■ Source B: Abraham Lincoln from first Lincoln–Douglas Debate at Ottawa, Illinois, 21 August
1858
. . . I have no purpose directly or indirectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where
it exists . . . I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and the black
races . . . I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong, having the superior posi-
tion . . . but . . . there is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights
enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness . . .
I agree . . . he is not my equal . . . perhaps not in moral or intellectual endowment.
■ Source C: New York Courier and Enquirer, 1 December 1860
We love the Union, because at home and abroad, collectively and individually, it gives us character as a
nation and as citizens of the Great Republic; because it gives us nationality as a People, renders us now the
equal of the greatest European Power, and in another half century, will make us the greatest, richest, and
most powerful people on the face of the earth.
■ Source D: Trenton Gazette, 3 January 1861
The present attempt at a forcible dissolution of the Union, is the result of a conspiracy which has been
brooded upon and actively conducted by ambitious men for nearly thirty years past . . . Their aim is to
found a Southern Empire, which shall be composed of the Southern States, Mexico, Central America, and
Cuba, of which the arch-conspirators are to be the rulers.
OCR QUESTION FORMAT
The questions and answers that follow are based on the OCR style.
(a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain the term ‘any man
attempting to kidnap’ in the context of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act. (20)
(b) Study Sources A and B. How far does Lincoln’s view on the issue of slavery in Source B
differ from Douglass’s perspective in Source A? (40)
(c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain how far
you agree with the view that the North went to war to abolish slavery. (60)
SOURCES • 59
1111 (a) Frederick Douglass is referring to any slave owner (or anyone helping him) attempting to ‘recapture’
2111 a runaway slave. He is suggesting that, in order to prevent Southerners from seizing escaped slaves, blacks
3 should take up arms and resist. The 1850 Fugitive Slave Act had made it easier for Southern slaveholders
4111 to come North and capture runaway slaves, and the federal government had committed itself to support
5 their actions. In some respects, Douglass’s suggestions of 1854 had already been put into practice in a
6 number of instances where both whites and blacks had used force of arms against slave owners, such as at
7 the ‘Battle of Christiana’ in 1851 and the incident involving slave William McHenry at Syracuse.
8
9 (b) In Source A, Douglass clearly takes the view that men should resort to the use of force to intimidate
10111 slave owners attempting to reclaim their property by talking of a ‘determination to shoot down any man
1 attempting to kidnap’, even though the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 permitted slave owners to seize escaped
2 slaves. He therefore condones the breaking of a law passed by Congress on the grounds of higher morality,
3 i.e. that it is fundamentally wrong to own slaves. He is quite clearly against slaveholding where it already
4 exists. Lincoln gives the impression in Source B that he is prepared to tolerate the continued existence of
5 slavery where it already exists and goes on to argue that blacks are perhaps inferior in certain ways to whites
6 ‘in moral or intellectual endowment’, which it may be assumed Douglass would have disagreed with. Lincoln
7 in some ways contradicts himself because, having said that he does not intend to ‘interfere with the insti-
8 tution of slavery in the States where it exists’, he goes on to argue that negroes should be entitled to ‘all
9 the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence’ which is clearly not possible if some
20111 blacks remain as slaves.
1
2 (c) The abolition of slavery was certainly not a stated reason for the North fighting in 1861. Lincoln
3 preferred to keep war aims to the preservation of the Union, in a successful attempt to keep as many
4 slaveholding states in the Union as possible. He was acutely aware that a declaration of intent to abolish
5 slavery would probably result in the secession of the four border states whose loyalty was absolutely vital
6 to Northern prospects of winning the war.
7 In Source A, Frederick Douglass certainly seems to suggest a strong intention to ‘put an end to . . .
8 slaveholding’, and a readiness to use force to do so, but as an ex-slave himself that might be expected. Even
9 by 1860, however, it is unlikely that Douglass spoke for a majority of white Northerners. In Source D, the
30 Trenton Gazette, having seen South Carolina secede, blames a conspiracy based on slaveholding for the
1 attempt to dissolve the Union. The newspaper does not state that the North must fight to abolish slavery,
2 but it clearly implies that slavery is at the root of the country’s problems, and therefore there may be an
3 implication that slavery should not be allowed to expand.
4 In Source B, Lincoln explicitly says he has ‘no purpose . . . to interfere with . . . slavery . . . where it
5 exists’, but it is also worth remembering that in 1858 Lincoln was standing in the Senate elections against
6 Stephen Douglas, and he would not have wanted to alarm voters unnecessarily. Having said that, Lincoln
7 consistently denied his intent to interfere with slavery, until of course he decided to do it for practical
8 reasons. Had the war been won quickly by the North it is highly likely that slavery would not have been
9 abolished when it was, and therefore it is probably true to say that Lincoln did not necessarily go to war
40 to abolish slavery, but to preserve the Union, as he constantly reiterated.
1 The New York Courier and Enquirer in Source C does not mention the issue of slavery but merely
2 outlines the advantages of the Union remaining intact, particularly looking to a future as the ‘greatest,
3 richest and most powerful people on the face of the earth’.
4 The key issue in the build-up to war, as far as most were concerned, was the expansion of slavery, not
45 slavery itself, although Southerners felt that, in the long term, if new states would all be free states, they
46 would become a permanent minority and increasingly marginalised within the Union. There was gross
47111 hypocrisy at the root of Northern policy: either slavery was disapproved of or it was not. The Republicans
48111 and Lincoln attempted to sit on the fence, which meant that abolitionists such as Douglass would never
49222 wholeheartedly support Lincoln. But Lincoln was a consummate pragmatist and judged public opinion
perfectly. Northerners would not have embraced war against the South in the way that they did, had the
abolition of slavery been a stated war aim at the outset. It can therefore be concluded that, although Lincoln
may have wanted to abolish slavery from a personal perspective, the North as a whole did not go to war
to abolish slavery.

(a) Study Source D. From this Source and your own knowledge explain the basis of the
‘slaveholder conspiracy’ which existed in the North by 1861. (20)
(b) Study Sources A and D. How far does Source A support the viewpoint put forward by the
Trenton Gazette in Source D regarding a Southern conspiracy? (40)
you agree that Southern states left the Union because of a ‘black republican’ conspiracy to
abolish slavery in the North. (60)
2 Understanding the Southern perspective
■ Source A: Speech of John C. Calhoun, read by James Mason to the Senate, 4 March 1850
What has caused this widely diffused and almost universal discontent? . . . One of the causes is, undoubt-
edly, to be traced to the long-continued agitation of the slave question on the part of the North, and the
many aggressions which they have made on the rights of the South . . . There is another lying back of it
. . . that may be regarded as the great and primary cause. This is to be found in the fact that the equilib-
rium between the two sections, in the Government as it stood when the constitution was ratified . . . has
been destroyed. At that time, there was nearly a perfect equilibrium between the two . . . but as it now
stands, one section has the exclusive power of controlling the Government, which leaves the other without
any adequate means of protecting itself against its encroachments and oppression.
■ Source B: Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of
South Carolina from the Federal Union 1860
A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in
the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are
hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he
has declared that that ‘Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free’, and that the public
mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.
■ Source C: Letter from Lincoln to Horace Greeley’s New York Tribune, 22 August 1862
If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the
slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.
■ Source D: Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government
(vol. 1, pp. 77–85), New York, 1881
The Southern States and Southern people have been sedulously represented as ‘propagandists’ of slavery,
and the Northern as the defenders and champions of universal freedom . . . It was not the passage of the
‘personal liberty laws’, it was not the circulation of incendiary documents, it was not the raid of John Brown,
SOURCES • 61
1111 it was not the operation of unjust and unequal tariff laws, nor all combined, that constituted the intoler-
2111 able grievance, but it was the systematic and persistent struggle to deprive the Southern States of equality
3 in the Union.
4111
5
OCR QUESTION FORMAT
6
8
9 (a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain what Calhoun meant by
10111 the ‘equilibrium between the two sections . . . has been destroyed’. (20)
1
(b) Study Sources B and C. How far does Source C bear out the fears surrounding Lincoln’s
2
election outlined in Source B by South Carolina? (40)
3
4 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain how far
5 you agree with the view that it was Northerners who were responsible for the outbreak of
6 the war. (60)
7
8 (a) Calhoun refers to the fact that when the Constitution was written, in 1787, the population and subse-
9 quent representation of Northern and Southern states in Congress was roughly equal, but that since then
20111 the North had outstripped the South in terms of population and had thus increased its representation over
1 that of the South. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 had kept the balance or ‘equilibrium’ between the
2 free and slave states in the Senate, but the Compromise of 1850 tipped the balance in favour of the free
3 states. Even though historians have pointed out that newly admitted California senators tended in practice
4 to be sympathetic to the South, as far as Calhoun was concerned, the writing was on the wall in that it
5 could only be a matter of time before the Southern states constituted a permanent minority in the Union,
6 given that new territories were likely to be settled by a majority of Northerners moving west.
7
8 (b) Lincoln’s comments in Source C reveal him as the arch-pragmatist, and certainly not strongly opposed
9 to slavery on any ideological grounds: this does not seem to bear out the fears, expressed by South Carolina,
30 that he ‘is hostile to slavery’ or intended to abolish slavery in the long term. Lincoln clearly implies that
1 his main priority is the preservation of the Union, and that he is prepared to ‘save the Union’ at almost
2 any cost whether that means freeing slaves or not. Source C however does imply some sort of contradic-
3 tion in Lincoln’s stance, for if he believes the US cannot continue to exist half slave and half free, he must
4 have believed at some point that slavery would be abolished. It is, then, perhaps not surprising that Southern
5 states were not reassured by his promises. Nonetheless, at face value, Source C certainly does not back the
6 view that Lincoln was staunchly committed to abolition.
7
8 (c) After the war, Jefferson Davis was understandably at pains to exonerate himself in his memoirs, and
9 concentrated on states’ rights and ‘equality in the Union’ (Source D), but he definitely blames the North
40 for the war. In many ways his arguments echo those of Calhoun, in Source A, where he talks about the
1 destruction of the equlibrium between the North and South. South Carolina’s exposition in the aftermath
2 of Lincoln’s election seems to identify the Northern threat to slavery as the root cause of secession. This is
3 linked to Calhoun and Davis’s comments in the sense that if Calhoun and Davis were both concerned
4 about the South being outvoted in Congress, or losing control of the Presidency, it was out of fear that the
45 North would seek to pursue its sectional aims over those of the South. These included a higher tariff, the
46 Homestead Act and possibly the abolition of slavery – and what was it that defined the major sectional
47 difference between North and South if not the institution of slavery.
48 Lincoln’s statement indicates he merely wished to ‘save the Union’, but it can be argued that state-
49222 ments he had made previously on slavery indicated that he was certainly in favour of stopping its expansion,
and, as South Carolina argued, slavery was ‘in the course of ultimate extinction’. In the short term, Lincoln’s
decision to uphold the Union and subsequently to invade the South was what caused the war, but perhaps
an alternative course of action would have been unthinkable, given all that the United States had been
through since 1776. It is of course fairly easy to construct an argument demonstrating that the preserva-
tion of the Union would probably have been to the disadvantage of the South. The South remains the
poorest and most marginalised region of the US to this day. Whether successful secession could have bene-
fited the South in the long term is unlikely, given that the basis of its economic wealth, cotton, would
probably have suffered eventually from foreign competition, and also that as other countries increasingly
disapproved of slavery they would refuse to trade with the South. Secession was a last-ditch attempt to
prevent the inevitable: the expansion of the number of free states of the US, resulting in the South becoming
a permanent minority and gradually losing its influence in all branches of federal government.

(a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain the ‘slave
question’. (20)
(b) Study Sources A and D. How far does Source A support the views expressed by Jefferson
Davis in Source D regarding the main grievance of the South? (40)
you agree that all the factors which contributed to the outbreak of war were in some way
related to the issue of slavery. (60)
Part 4: Historical skills
1 Conspiracy everywhere
Students should divide into Northerners and Southerners and then research the evidence for the rival
conspiracy theories that played such a prominent role in the build-up to the war. This textbook contains
many references to ‘slave power’ and ‘black republican’ conspiracies but further research will bring even
more far-fetched theories. The exercise should allow students to empathise with those who believed in such
conspiracies at the time.
2 Who was most to blame?
This exercise should focus on the roles of individuals rather than the wider factors. Students should concen-
trate on leading and influential figures in the build-up to the war, such as: John Calhoun, Henry Clay,
Harriet Beecher Stowe, William Lloyd Garrison, Stephen Douglas, John Brown, John Tyler, James
Buchanan, William Seward and Abraham Lincoln. They should, based on evidence, try to rank the men in
order of their accountability for the outbreak of war.
1111 Sources and references

2111
3 Malcolm Bradbury and Howard Temperley (eds), Intro- Michael Johnson (ed.), Abraham Lincoln, Slavery, and the
4111 duction to American Studies, Longman (1998). Civil War – Selected Writings and Speeches, Bedford
5 Ken Burns, The Civil War (video), DD Video (1989). (2001).
6 Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Revolution, McGraw-Hill Brian Holden Reid, The Origins of the American Civil War,
7 (2000). Longman (1996).
8 Hugh Brogan, The Penguin History of the USA, Penguin Michael Holt, The Political Crisis of the 1850s, Norton
(1985/1999). (1978).
9
Henry Steele Commager, The Blue and the Gray, The Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University
10111
Fairfax Press (1982). Press (1983/1995).
1 Alan Farmer, The Origins of the American Civil War James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, Penguin
2 1846–1861, Hodder & Stoughton (1996a). (1990).
3 Alan Farmer, The American Civil War 1861–1865, Hodder James McPherson, For Cause and Comrades, Oxford
4 & Stoughton (1996b). University Press (1997).
5 Alan Farmer and Vivienne Sanders, American History John M. Murrin, Paul E. Johnson, James M. McPherson
6 1860–1990, Hodder & Stoughton (2002). et al., Liberty Equality Power, Harcourt (2001).
7 Paul Finkelman, ‘James Buchanan’, in Melvin Urofsky Derrick Murphy, Kathryn Cooper and Mark Waldron,
8 (ed.), The American Presidents, Garland Publishing United States 1776–1992, Collins (2001).
9 (2000). Russel B. Nye, Fettered Freedom, Michigan State University
Eric Foner, Politics and Ideology in the Age of the Civil Press (1949). Quoted in Kenneth Stampp (ed.),
20111
War, Oxford University Press (1980). Quoted in The Causes of the Civil War, Touchstone, Simon &
1
Lawrence Goodheart, Richard Brown and Stephen Schuster (1991), p. 20.
2 Rabe (eds), Problems in American Civilisation, D.C. Kenneth Stampp (ed.), The Causes of the Civil War,
3 Heath (1993). Touchstone, Simon & Schuster (1991).
4 Eric Foner, Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men, Oxford Hugh Tulloch, The Debate on the American Civil War Era,
5 University Press (1970). Quoted in Kenneth Stampp Manchester University Press (1999).
6 (ed.), The Causes of the Civil War, Touchstone (1991). Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
7 Susan-Mary Grant, ‘For God and Country . . .’, History Longman (1996).
8 Today, issue 50 (7), July (2000).
9
30
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3
4
5
6
7
8
9
40
1
2
3
4
45
46
47
48
49222
Chapter 4
The American Civil War,

1861–1865
This chapter will focus on the war itself through the analysis of strategy, leadership and
other factors which contributed to the ultimate preservation of the Union.
Historical background Sources
The outbreak of war and the taking of sides 1 Emancipation

The advantages of each side and strategy 2 Leadership during the war
The eastern and western theatres, 1861–1862
Emancipation, Gettysburg and Vicksburg
The appointment of Grant, Lincoln’s re-election Historical skills
and the end of the war
Why the North won 1 Songs of ‘the Blue and the Gray’
2 Statistics on their side
Essays
Northern war aims and the advantages of both

sides
Emancipation and the black contribution to the
Northern war effort
The turning point in 1863 and the changes in
warfare
Northern resources and Presidential leadership
Southern strategy and advantages, and military
leadership
1111
2111 Chronology
3
4111 1861 Confederate States of America (CSA) formed
5 Jefferson Davis became President of the Confederacy
6 First shots of the war fired at Fort Sumter
7 First Battle of Bull Run (Manassas)
8 1862 Union troops captured Forts Henry and Donaldson
9 Battle of the Merrimac (Virginia) and the Monitor
10111 Battle of Shiloh
1 Military draft in Confederacy
2 Union captured New Orleans
3 Stonewall Jackson’s Shenandoah valley campaign
4 Lee took command of the army of Northern Virginia
5 McClellan’s Peninsula campaign
6 Second Battle of Bull Run
7 Lee invaded Maryland
8 Battle of Antietam
9 Battle of Fredericksburg
20111 1863 Emancipation Proclamation
1 Conscription for the Union forces
2 Battle of Chancellorsville
3 Grant appointed commander-in-chief of Union forces
4 Battle of Gettysburg
5 Surrender of Vicksburg
6 Anti-draft riots in New York City
7 Attack on Fort Wagner
8 Battle of Chickamauga
9 Battle of Chattanooga
30 1864 Battle of the Wilderness
1 Battle of Spotsylvania
2 Fall of Atlanta
3 Sherman’s march to Savannah
4 Lincoln re-elected as President
5 Battle of Nashville
6 1865 Confederate evacuation of Richmond
7 Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox
8 Lincoln assassinated
9
40
1
2
3
4
45 The outbreak of war and the taking of sides
46
47 The secession of seven states from the Lower South over the winter of 1860/1 was met with inactivity by
48 ‘lame duck’ President Buchanan as he saw out his term of office. By the time Lincoln took over in March,
49222 the ‘rebel states’ had sworn in Jefferson Davis as a provisional President. Southerners had already taken
66 • THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR, 1861–1865
control of 11 forts and military installations in the Confederacy, when the news came through that Lincoln
intended to send supplies to the US garrison in Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor. On 12 April 1861
Confederate forces opened fire on the fort, claiming that, as South Carolina no longer belonged to the
Union, US soldiers had no right to occupy the fort. Lincoln’s determination to preserve the Union meant
that he had little option other than to order a blockade of the Confederate coastline and the raising of an
army of 75,000 men. His action provoked the secession in May of four more Southern states, including
Virginia, a state which would prove vital to the South’s war effort, and the consequent loss of Robert E.
Lee, a man to whom Lincoln had offered high command in the Union army.
It was absolutely vital for Lincoln that no more of the slaveholding states seceded and it was with this
in mind that Lincoln remarked: ‘I hope to have God on my side but I must have Kentucky.’ The position
of Maryland was also crucial, for had it seceded Washington DC itself would have been left in ‘enemy terri-
tory’, so Lincoln acted quickly to ensure that secessionists there were suppressed. Fortunately for him the
border slave states decided not to leave the Union, but it had been a close run thing, and ultimately perhaps
affected the outcome of the war. Had the slave states of Maryland, Kentucky, Delaware and Missouri joined
the Confederacy, its white population would have increased by 45 per cent and its manufacturing capacity
by 80 per cent. Lincoln’s decision not to make the war an anti-slavery war initially had paid off. In addi-
tion the Confederacy also contained areas of discontent, usually the more mountainous regions away from
the plantations. The western uplands of Virginia actually seceded from the Confederacy to join the Union
in June 1861 and form the state of West Virginia in 1863, and in fact Union regiments were raised from
every Southern state except one.
The advantages of each side and strategy
It is easy, with hindsight, to adopt the view that the result of the war was a foregone conclusion from the
start, given the advantages the North possessed in terms of population and resources, but that was certainly
not a widely held view at the time. The onus was on the North to defeat the South, which covered an area
of 750,000 square miles. This meant not only having to win battles but also having to occupy territory. The
South could therefore, as Jenkins (1997) has put it, ‘win by not
Figure 4.1 General Robert E. Lee losing’. The South lacked obvious targets apart from Richmond,
had interior lines of communication and a very long coastline,
which would be difficult to blockade. The longer the South resisted
the greater the chance of war weariness growing in the North. The
South was defending its own territory and way of life and thus
morale tended to be higher. There was also a belief, not just con-
fined to the South, that Southerners would make better soldiers
than Northerners. Given the existence of slave labour, a higher
proportion of whites could be released (from agricultural produc-
tion) to fight than in the North. Britain would continue to need
Southern cotton, the sales of which could support the war effort,
while France and Russia had no great desire to have to compete
with an economically strong United States. British and French
ships were expected to break the Northern blockade with ease.
Nevertheless, the North was greatly superior to the South in
terms of resources (with an estimated 30:1 capacity over the South
to produce munitions), but it was only in a long drawn-out war
that such resources would give an advantage. The North produced
94 per cent of US pig iron, over 90 per cent of coal and firearms,
80 per cent of wheat and had twice as much railroad mileage
1111 (which was also better integrated in terms of gauges). In terms of population, 22 million Northerners faced
2111 9 million Southerners, nearly 4 million of whom were slaves and would not be used as soldiers. The North
3 also kept control of the US navy and merchant navy, which allowed it to blockade the Southern coastline
4111 as part of the so-called ‘anaconda strategy’ of Winfield Scott, the first supreme commander of the Union
5 forces. Scott proposed to send one army to split the Confederacy by taking control of the Mississippi, while
6 another force would invade Tennessee in the west. A third would march on the Southern capital of
7 Richmond in the east, and at the same time the Confederate coastline would be blockaded. This might
8 however take time, and such a campaign of attrition could well lead to ‘war weariness’ in the North, which
9 could be exploited by those seeking peace.
10111
1
2 The eastern and western theatres, 1861–1862
3
4 Lincoln demonstrated his own confidence early on in the war by ignoring the advice of Winfield Scott, and
5 ordering an attack on Confederate forces in the east at the important railroad crossroads of Manassas in
6 July 1861. He believed that the war could be ended if General Irvin McDowell could beat his Southern
7 counterpart, Pierre Beauregard (the man who had commanded the Southern shelling of Fort Sumter), but
8 in the first major battle of the war at Bull Run, Virginia (or Manassas to Southerners who preferred to
9 name battles after the nearest inhabited place, rather than geographical feature as favoured by the North),
20111 the Confederates defeated the Union forces, following the despatch of 12,000 Confederate reinforcements
1 by rail. McDowell’s retreat back to Washington was hampered by civilians who had come to watch the
2 battle and picnic nearby. This major blow to the Union cause prompted Lincoln to call up a further 500,000
3 recruits, pursue a policy of multiple offensives and intensify the naval blockade. On 10 August, at Wilson’s
4 Creek, Missouri, a Union force defeated secessionists attempting to lead their state out of the Union. General
5 George McClellan in the meantime moved his force into western Virginia to help anti-secessionists who
6 wished to remain in the Union.
7 In April 1862, Union ironclad and wooden boats under David Farragut helped to take New Orleans
8 by coming from the south rather than the north as the Confederate high command had expected. This was
9 the first major Union victory. New Orleans was the largest city in the South as well as the most important
30 banking centre; and control of it prevented Confederate trade using the mouth of the Mississippi River.
1 James A. Smith, a young seaman in the Union navy, wrote a letter to his parents in England on 9 July 1862
2 and optimistically reported, ‘The war is very near ended’ (unpublished diary).
3 In early 1862, General Ulysses S. Grant had begun a major campaign in the west to win control of the
4 Tennessee and Cumberland rivers. Confederates had built a fort on each of the rivers, which held the key
5 to Kentucky and western Tennessee, and also the Mississippi. Having taken Forts Henry and Donelson, in
6 April he was taken by surprise at Shiloh, near the Tennessee-Mississippi boundary, by Beauregard and
7 Albert Johnston (who was killed in the battle), and it was only after being reinforced by Don Carlos Buell
8 that Grant was able to force a Confederate withdrawal. Nonetheless, Union forces subsequently controlled
9 the upper and lower reaches of the Mississippi. Braxton Bragg invaded Kentucky and drew Buell’s forces
40 out of Tennessee but, following the Battle of Perryville in October 1862, Bragg retreated south to be slowly
1 pursued by first Buell, and then his replacement William Rosecrans, who forced Bragg to retreat after the
2 Battle of Murfreesboro (Stone’s River) in December/January 1862/3.
3 In the eastern theatre, which certainly was given more emphasis by the South, General George
4 McClellan who had spent the winter of 1861/2 training the army of the Potomac, made slow progress in
45 his attempt to take Richmond. He moved west towards Richmond along a peninsula between the York and
46 James rivers, and, by the end of May, was within five miles of the Southern capital. The Confederate govern-
47 ment prepared to evacuate, having lost much of Tennessee and the Mississippi valley, as well as New Orleans.
48 Joseph E. Johnston’s Confederate forces attacked McClellan at Seven Pines (Fair Oaks). McClellan awaited
49222 the arrival of McDowell’s army from the north and the Confederates withdrew to Richmond. A wounded
Johnston was replaced as commander by Robert E. Lee who, having recalled Thomas ‘Stonewall’ Jackson
from his brilliant campaign occupying far superior numbers of Union troops in the Shenandoah valley,
fought McClellan skilfully in a series of costly but indecisive actions in the Seven Days Battle during June
and July 1862. McClellan subsequently would not advance on Richmond.
John Pope, took over command from McClellan and his army of Virginia, which had incorporated
most of the army of the Potomac, and was ordered to move to Richmond, but he was defeated by Lee at
the Second Battle of Bull Run (Manassas) in August 1862. Pope was replaced by McClellan who pursued
Lee’s invasion of Maryland in September, but, despite gaining information about Lee’s positions and orders,
he failed to inflict a decisive victory on the rebels with his numerically superior force at Antietam (called
Sharpsburg in the South) in September 1862. Antietam did however prove critical in the sense that it
prevented European recognition of the Confederacy and also prompted Lincoln to issue a preliminary
Emancipation Proclamation that proposed to free all slaves in rebel states. This made it extremely unlikely
that France or Britain would recognise the Confederacy in the future. Lincoln replaced McClellan for good
with Ambrose Burnside in November, but he proved to be no better and was soundly defeated in December
1862 at Fredericksburg, Virginia, on the Rappahannock river.
Emancipation, Gettysburg and Vicksburg
Emancipation was a calculated risk for Lincoln, and it was one which paid off. As well as giving the war a
new and more noble cause, it opened up another source of recruitment and by the end of the war over
200,000 black troops had served in the Union armies. In the mid-terms of 1862, the Democrats nearly won
control of the House of Representatives, but support for Lincoln returned in 1863. According to Philip
Jenkins , ‘1863 proved to be the pivotal year of the war in which the South lost the strategic initiative’(1997:
p. 142). Lincoln had made Joseph Hooker his new army commander but he was defeated at Chancellorsville
in May 1863 by Lee. It may have been the Virginian’s greatest victory but he did not destroy the Union
army and he crucially lost ‘Stonewall’ Jackson, who died from wounds inflicted by his own troops when
they failed to recognise him returning to the lines. Lee followed up Chancellorsville by invading the North,
with his initial target being the rail junction at Harrisburg, which would allow him to cut Union supply
lines from east to west, and might well contribute to greater war weariness in the North.
Figure 4.2
Confederate soldiers
captured at Gettysburg
1111 When Hooker was refused his requested further reinforcements, he resigned, being replaced by George
2111 Meade. Meade fought Lee’s army at Gettysburg in July 1863, where he held a defensive position and
3 succeeded in fighting off Lee’s attacks, although he did not follow Lee’s retreating army. Nevertheless
4111 Gettysburg marked the last time that Confederate forces were able to threaten Northern territory seriously.
5 On 4 July, the same day that Lee withdrew from Gettysburg, Union forces under Grant captured Vicksburg,
6 the major Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi, which divided the eastern Confederate states from
7 Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas. There followed a Union defeat for Rosecrans by Bragg at Chickamauga in
8 September 1863 and he retreated to Chattanooga, to be replaced by George Thomas. Grant, Hooker and
9 William Sherman at the Battle of Chattanooga in November, routed the forces of Bragg, who was duly
10111 replaced by Joseph E. Johnston. Northern troops had driven Confederates back into Georgia and taken
1 control of most of eastern Tennessee as well as the Tennessee river. A fourth Confederate state was thereby
2 cut off from the remaining seven.
3
4
5 The appointment of Grant, Lincoln’s re-election and the end of the war
6
7 In March 1864, Grant took over from Henry Halleck as commander of all Union armies. His strategy
8 was for Sherman’s army of the west, in Georgia, to destroy the remains of Johnston’s Confederate army
9 and their supplies, while he moved with George Meade’s army of the Potomac against Richmond. On his
20111 way to Richmond, Grant fought the costly and indecisive Battle of the Wilderness (May 1864) and was
1 then defeated by Lee at Spotsylvania Court House (also May 1864). Further losses were sustained at Cold
2 Harbor in June where there were 6,000 Union casualties in a single hour. On 3 June, one young Union
3 soldier, in his last diary entry, wrote simply: ‘I was killed.’ Grant failed to take the vital rail centre of
4 Petersburg from Beauregard in the same month. During the Wilderness campaign, in the space of a month
5 Grant lost 55,000 men – killed, wounded or captured – against Lee’s 31,000. Shortly afterwards, by way
6 of distraction, Jubal Early attacked the outskirts of Washington DC itself, but was turned round at the
7 Battle of Fort Stevens on 12 July. In the meantime, Grant had changed his strategy and he besieged
8 the vital railhead of Petersburg for nine months, eventually cutting off Richmond from the rest of the
9 Confederacy. In the west, Sherman had advanced towards Atlanta but was defeated heavily by Johnston at
30 Kennesaw Mountain in June 1864. Jefferson Davis rewarded Johnston’s campaign, to the astonishment
1 of his men, by replacing him as head of Confederate forces in the west by John Bell Hood, who eventually
2 abandoned Atlanta, one of the key transportation centres of the Confederacy in September, boosting
3 Lincoln’s chances of re-election considerably.
4 Lincoln was re-elected in November 1864 as the candidate of the so-called Union Party, a loose alliance
5 of Republicans and ‘War Democrats’. George Thomas finished off Hood at Nashville in December while
6 Sherman began a 300 mile march of destruction through Georgia. Having reached Savannah in December,
7 he turned North wreaking further destruction through the Carolinas. By 1865 Union forces numbered
8 perhaps one million while Confederate troops in the field totalled 200,000. Lee, having been made general-
9 in-chief, had reinstated Johnston who took the realistic option by surrendering to Sherman in North
40 Carolina in April 1865. In the east, Confederate forces evacuated Richmond and Petersburg in April 1865
1 and, having been prevented from meeting up with Johnston’s men, Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox
2 Court House on 9 April. On 14 April Lincoln was assassinated.
3
4
45 Why the North won
46
47 The longer the war went on, the more it was likely that the North would win, provided of course that
48 there was no foreign intervention on behalf of the South, that morale held up and that Lincoln got himself
49222 re-elected in 1864. There were times when war weariness in the North seriously threatened the outcome
of the conflict, but ultimately victory was ensured by the Figure 4.3 Emaciated Union Army soldier
North’s greater numbers and resources, stronger economic after his release from Andersonville
and financial system and better intelligence system, as well Prison Camp, 1865
as, eventually, the effects of Northern naval supremacy and
the blockade. In addition, of course, it can be argued that
Lincoln proved to be a better wartime leader than Jefferson
Davis, and that the North pursued a more effective strategy
than the South, with Davis following a vaguely defined
‘offensive-defensive’ strategy, and being unwilling to give
up parts of the South that he might have been wise to.
Part 2: Essays
Northern war aims and the advantages

of both sides
1 (a) What were the aims of the North at the

beginning of the American Civil War? (30)
(b) Assess the relative advantages held by each
side in 1861. (60)
(OCR)
(a) In fairly broad terms, the North aimed to preserve the

Union while the South aimed to win its independence. The
extent to which the abolition of slavery was a war aim of
the North at the outset is debatable. Brogan maintains it was always Lincoln’s intention to abolish slavery,
but he could not let this be known, at least not until he was in stronger position. One of the reasons he
would not have felt sufficiently confident to do so was because there was a good chance that four slave
states would not join the Confederacy, and Lincoln’s main short-term aim was to ensure that the so-called
‘border states’ did not secede.
Lincoln said that hoped to have God on his side, but added that he must have Kentucky. Maryland
too was vital, and it is likely it would have followed Virginia’s decision to secede, making Washington
untenable as the Northern capital, had Lincoln not made quick arrests and rapidly deployed troops.
Missouri, Kentucky and Maryland would have increased the Confederacy’s population by 45 per cent and
its manufacturing capacity by 80 per cent. It is true that the ‘border states’ produced about as many soldiers
for the South as the North during the war, but their real significance was geographical. The Ohio river
was the key to the Mississippi, which was vital to the Northern war effort as it divided the Confederacy in
two. The South did not appreciate its importance until too late. Lincoln had successfully created the impres-
sion that Richmond was his main aim, but he knew the South could survive without it. Nonetheless,
Richmond was only about 100 miles from Washington and, if it could be captured, Southern morale might
collapse. As well as being the political centre of the South, it was also a medical and manufacturing centre,
and the primary supply depot for Confederate troops in the north-east.
Lincoln also realised that destroying the Confederate armies in the field rather than occupying large
areas of the South was the key to finishing the war. Strategy initially revolved around the so-called ‘anaconda
plan’, which aimed to starve the South into surrender with a coastal blockade and increase of military pres-
sure on land and major rivers, but Lincoln, whether influenced by public opinion or the possibility of
ending the war more quickly, ordered McDowell to advance into Virginia.
ESSAYS • 71
1111 (b) The Confederacy aimed to exist independently from the Union, and did not have to totally defeat
2111 Union forces or occupy large areas of the North to achieve that. The North, however, did have to totally
3 defeat Confederate armies and occupy large areas of the 750,000 square miles of Southern territory to win.
4111 This was not going to be easy. The mountains, rivers, wide streams, dense forest areas, swamps and marshes
5 would be difficult to penetrate. In wet weather many roads in the South turned to mud. In Virginia, rivers
6 flowing west to east formed natural defensive barriers for the South. The Shenandoah valley led away from
7 Richmond but could be used by Confederates to strike into the North. In addition the South had interior
8 lines of communication, familiar ground, a coastline extending 3,500 miles, over 20 major ports, plus 150
9 places where ships could unload which probably largely cancelled out the North’s manpower advantage.
10111 The fact that Southerners were effectively fighting to defend their homes was almost certainly a stronger
1 motivating factor than saving the Union was for Northerners. Southern white opinion was firmly committed
2 to the war from the outset, but Northern opinion was more divided – although all Confederate states except
3 South Carolina actually provided regiments to fight for the Union. There was also a feeling in both North
4 and South that Southern boys might make better soldiers than their Yankee adversaries, but the majority
5 of soldiers and officers in the regular army remained loyal to the Union.
6 If the South could hold out long enough there was a good chance that disillusion would grow in the
7 North. Also, given that 75 per cent of Britain’s raw cotton came from the South, there was a belief that the
8 British navy would break the Union blockade, and there was also a feeling that economically the South
9 might be better off than the North.
20111 One of the main advantages held by the North lay in the size of its population. Immigrants to the US
1 had tended to settle in the North and that continued to be true during the war. They were often met by
2 recruitment officers when they got off the boat, and by the end of the war the Union army contained
3 German brigades, Italian regiments, an Irish brigade, and at the First Battle of Bull Run there was even a
4 Scottish regiment fighting in kilts. The North’s population was 22.5 million, the South’s 9 million, and that
5 included nearly 4 million slaves who would not be fighting, although the fact that they could mainly work
6 on the land meant that the South could actually enlist a higher proportion of its white male population
7 than the North. The reality of it was however that the Confederacy had only 2 million men of military age
8 against the North’s 7 million, and that was not counting the hundreds of thousands of blacks in the North
9 who might be allowed to serve.
30 The other key advantage the North possessed was the extent of its manufacturing capacity. It boasted
1 90 per cent of the country’s industrial capacity and shipping, 80 per cent of its bank capital (most capital
2 in the South was tied up in land and slaves leaving little for the purchase of bonds to finance the war),
3 75 per cent of its railroad mileage which was better integrated than the South’s (although, once in the South,
4 Union troops would become dependent on Southern railroads and have long lines of communication to
5 protect), better rolling stock, and 75 per cent of its taxable wealth. In a long war, the North clearly looked
6 the better bet. However, neither side expected it to be a long war.
7
8
Emancipation and the black contribution to the Northern war effort
9
40
2 (a) What contribution did blacks make to the Northern war effort after emancipation? (30)
1
2 (b) Explain why Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation when he did? (60)
3 (OCR)
4
45 (a) Following the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, slaves escaped from plantations in greater numbers
46 than before, which certainly served to weaken the Confederate military effort, and over the next two years
47 100 regiments and 16 companies of US Colored Infantry, 11 regiments and 4 companies of US Colored
48 Heavy Artillery, 10 batteries of the Colored Light Artillery, and 6 regiments of US Colored Cavalry were
49222 raised. By the end of the war 186,000 black soldiers and sailors (of whom 134,000 were recruited in slave
states) had served in Union forces, and blacks came to make up 10 per cent of the total fighting force,
although they comprised only 1 per cent of the North’s population. Although 3,000 died on the battlefield,
the black mortality rate was higher than the white overall due to the number of diseases caught from
labouring long hours in insanitary conditions and lower levels of immunity. Generally, blacks were widely
discriminated against, receiving poor quality training, weapons and medical aid, and more fatigue duties.
Black soldiers also had a much harsher deal at the hands of the enemy. The Fort Pillow massacre of over
260 captured black soldiers in 1864 was not typical, but it did show that blacks could expect little sympathy
at the hands of their erstwhile masters.
The first major action for black regiments was the attack on Port Hudson on the Mississippi in
Louisiana in 1863 where they proved their bravery. In May and June at Milliken’s Bend near Vicksburg,
black regiments fought well, and in July the Massachusetts 54th led the attack on Fort Wagner in South
Carolina, losing over half its men. In 1864, after Cold Harbor, Grant crossed the James river and moved
against Petersburg. Union soldiers took Fort Harrison on 29 September where Medals of Honor were
awarded to 14 black soldiers.
The impact of blacks on the Northern military effort can perhaps best be viewed in the light of Robert
E. Lee’s request that black slaves be allowed to fight for the South.
(b) According to Murrin et al. it was the military situation that determined the timing of the Emancipation
Proclamation as well as its scope. Lincoln himself called it a military necessity, and took the view that,
following the Confederate success at the Second Battle of Bull Run and subsequent invasion of Maryland,
the Union could only win the war by making the abolition of slavery a war aim. He accepted Seward’s
advice to wait for a military victory before ‘upping the stakes’ of the war, rather than making it look like
an act of desperation.
In March 1861, as part of an attempt to appeal to Unionist feeling in the Confederacy, and to dissuade
the states of the Upper South and ‘border region’ from seceding, Lincoln reiterated that his main aim was
to safeguard the Union rather than to safeguard or destroy slavery. Brogan and others however have implied
that Lincoln was being less than honest when he said this, and that, in reality, slavery was the central issue
of the war from the start but that Lincoln could not afford to admit this. In other words, he had always
wanted to free the slaves but was not in a position to say so until the duration and casualty rate of the war
had made emancipation and the possible enlistment of blacks acceptable to the majority of Northerners.
This appears to make sense, given that great pains were taken to reassure the Northern public that it was
essentially a method for winning the war. Even the issue of the initial draft of the Emancipation
Proclamation could be regarded as a test of public opinion before it was formalised on 1 January 1863.
Whatever Lincoln’s personal motives may have been, he had a fair idea that making the abolition of slavery
a major issue would isolate the South internationally, and end the possibility of formal recognition of the
Confederacy by Britain.
As early as 1861 Congress had in fact passed the Confiscation Act, which declared that all slaves used
for ‘insurrectionary’ purposes (i.e. helping the Confederate war effort) would be regarded as free. In the
spring of 1862 slavery was abolished in the District of Columbia and the western territories, with compen-
sation provided for owners. And in July 1862 the second Confiscation Act declared that the slaves of any
whites who supported the Confederacy were free and also allowed Lincoln to employ blacks, including ex-
slaves, as soldiers. There had also been unofficial attempts to liberate slaves such as that in 1861 by General
Benjamin Butler who gave protection to runaway slaves in Virginia and refused to return them to slave
owners saying they were ‘contraband of war’. Butler immediately became a favourite with the Radical
Republicans but Lincoln believed his actions contravened the Fugitive Slave Law, although a cabinet meeting
agreed not to take action. Three months later Major General John C. Fremont, Union commander in St
Louis, declared that all slaves owned by Confederates in Missouri were free. Lincoln asked him to free only
those owned by men actively working for the Southern cause bringing it into line with the 1861 Confiscation
Act, and sacked him when he refused to, infuriating Radicals who saw it as a way of reassuring the border
ESSAYS • 73
1111 states (which had been horrified by Fremont’s actions). In addition, in 1862, Major General David Hunter,
2111 having begun to enlist black soldiers, announced that all slaves in Georgia, Florida and South Carolina
3 were free. Lincoln told him to take back his declaration and to disband the 1st South Carolina Volunteers
4111 regiment (of African descent). Brigadier General Jim Lane in Kansas simply ignored the War Department
5 and raised a black regiment, the First Kansas Colored Volunteers, in 1862 – though it was not officially
6 recognised until 1863 by which time it had already fought.
7 With the growing casualty list many of the political leaders in the North also came to take the view
8 that there should be a higher cause to the war in order to justify so many deaths. The increasing influence
9 of the Radicals also put Lincoln under more pressure, while Horace Greeley had openly criticised Lincoln
10111 over his treatment of Hunter and for not making slavery the main issue of the war. There existed there-
1 fore a growing momentum to abolish slavery and Lincoln skilfully put himself at the head of it before it
2 became active opposition to him. Nonetheless, had he acted earlier the loose and sometimes uneasy coali-
3 tion between Republicans of different shades, Democrats and border states may well have collapsed. Once
4 War Department solicitor William Whiting advised him that the President’s war powers allowed him to
5 emancipate the slaves under the commander-in-chief’s power to confiscate enemy property, Lincoln was
6 prepared to move.
7 On 22 September 1862, following the Battle of Antietam, which he chose to regard as a victory, Lincoln
8 issued the Emancipation Proclamation: it stated that on 1 January 1863 all slaves would be declared free
9 in the states still in rebellion – hence it did not apply to slaves in states or parts of states already under
20111 Union control and the border states. In other words it did not free a single slave at the time. The final draft
1 of the Proclamation had removed a passage suggesting that the government was prepared to support slave
2 rebellions in the South (due to pressure from conservatives in the cabinet) and Lincoln had also accepted
3 a clause allowing former slaves to enlist in the Union army (under pressure from the Radicals) although
4 in reality the War Department had sanctioned the recruitment of black troops in August 1862.
5 The decision to emancipate the slaves came when the war was not going well, and at the time of the
6 first draft (conscription) in the North. Susan-Mary Grant argues that racist objections to blacks being armed
7 could be countered by the argument that it was better for a black soldier to die than a white one. Nonetheless,
8 the raising of black regiments resulted in a white backlash towards emancipation, and it was only once
9 blacks started to prove themselves on the battlefield that attitudes started to change. Many Northern soldiers
30 initially objected to Lincoln turning the conflict into ‘a nigger war’, and Grant argues that the Proclamation
1 made the North’s morale problem worse. Although McPherson has found evidence that more than twice
2 as many of those soldiers expressing an opinion supported the measure as opposed it. Some Democrats
3 warned that emancipation would lead to freed blacks coming to the North to take white jobs and, judging
4 by the appalling level of violence directed against blacks, essentially by the Irish during the New York draft
5 riots, many believed the warnings.
6
7
8
The turning point in 1863 and the changes in warfare
9
40
3 (a) How far was 1863 the crucial year in determining the outcome of the war? (30)
1
2 (b) How far did warfare change during the American Civil War? (60)
3 (OCR)
4
45 (a) There is strong evidence, particularly in respect of the Battle of Gettysburg and the fall of Vicksburg,
46 that 1863 was a crucial year in determining the outcome of the war, but stronger evidence still that it was
47 not the crucial year, with key turning points taking place in 1861, 1862 and 1864.
48 It could be argued that 1861 was a key year in determining the outcome of the war in the sense that
49222 Lincoln managed to keep the loyalty of the border states. It is quite possible that had the Confederacy
gained the extra manpower and industrial resources contained within those four states, as well as their
crucial defensive topology, it could have won its independence.
It has been argued that in the summer 1862 the Second Battle of Bull Run followed by the invasion
of Maryland and counter-offensives in the west brought the Confederacy to the peak of its power, and
offered the realistic possibility of Confederate success, convincing Lincoln that slavery must become an
aim of war. By the end of 1862 the Confederacy was on the back foot having lost much of Tennessee,
New Orleans (its biggest city and most important port), Norfolk (the major port of Virginia), and having
Charleston, Mobile and Savannah blockaded. In addition, the Battle of Antietam, despite being a drawn
action, convinced Lincoln to go ahead with emancipation, effectively putting paid to Southern hopes that
European aid for their cause might be forthcoming, and possibly preventing a Democrat victory in the
November elections of 1862. This is why Alan Farmer has pinpointed Antietam as the key turning point
of the war. It could of course be argued that Britain would not have given formal recognition to the
Confederacy in any case, that Lincoln’s powers as commander-in-chief would not have been limited by
Democrat majorities in Congress, and that McClellan missed a great opportunity to follow through and
destroy Lee’s army after Antietam, thus allowing the South to fight again.
By 1863 Lee’s army of northern Virginia was perhaps as effective a fighting force as any in history, but
it was not invincible – and the Battle of Gettysburg was to shatter the myth that it was, giving a much
needed boost to Northern morale. Gettysburg has however at times been overrated as a major turning
point, although it did mark the ‘high tide’ of the Confederacy. Had Lee beaten Meade at Gettysburg,
there could have been foreign recognition of the Confederacy and Lee’s army could well have occupied
key Northern cities, although it almost certainly lacked the manpower and ammunition to hold them
for any length of time. Such a loss could well have led to the spread of defeatist sentiments in the North,
and put Lincoln under great pressure to come to terms. Jones sees Gettysburg as decisive in that Lee was
never able to take the offensive again. It should be remembered, however, that nearly another two years of
fighting took place after Gettysburg, as did major draft riots, and a decline in the value of ‘greenbacks’ and
government bonds in 1864, during which time Northern will could still have ebbed and Lincoln
could still have lost the Presidential election. Meade was in no position to follow up Gettysburg and Lee
remained in control of northern Virginia. From a strategic point of view Gettysburg was far less important
than the Confederate loss of Vicksburg which also took place in July. The capture of Vicksburg and Port
Hudson gave the Union control of the Mississippi and thus split the Confederacy in two. Maintaining
control of the river would of course use up a lot of Northern troops, and some have argued that there was
not a great deal of trade passing between those Confederate states west of the river and those east of it
anyway. But Brogan has argued that following Gettysburg and Vicksburg the strategic initiative passed to
the North, and if Northern morale held out it was only a matter of time before the North won – but that
was a big ‘if ’.
In November, at the Battle of Chattanooga, Union forces drove Confederates back into Georgia
and took control of the Tennessee river leaving four of the eleven states cut off from the rest. Murrin has
argued that, over the winter of 1863/4, Southern morale suffered significantly, with desertions from the
army increasing, inflation rising and greater criticism of Davis’s leadership becoming apparent, and candi-
dates opposed to Davis’s aims came close to winning control of the Confederate Congress. Southern
morale however did not break, leaving the possibilities that a war of attrition could still be fought and that
impatience to end the war could result in Lincoln not being returned as President – and this came quite
close to happening.
Following the Union triumphs of 1863 there was high expectation in the North that fairly soon Grant
in Virginia and Sherman in Georgia would deliver the final blows to the South. However by the summer
of 1864 severe Union casualties, particularly at Spotsylvania Court House and Cold Harbor, and lack of
success in the east had increased the demand for peace negotiations in the North. There was a realistic
chance Lincoln would not be re-elected. (In fact, Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune became involved
ESSAYS • 75
1111 in peace negotiations with Lincoln’s approval.) However on 2 September Sherman captured Atlanta, which
2111 perhaps saved the election for Lincoln. Sherman’s subsequent devastating ‘March to the Sea’, Sheridan’s
3 defeat of Early’s army in the Shenandoah valley, and the wearing down of Lee’s forces in the Wilderness
4111 made victory inevitable and the South lost the will to continue.
5 In many ways 1864 was the crucial year in determining the outcome of the war, for despite the Northern
6 successes of 1863 the South was still in a position to carry on fighting. It was the campaigns of 1864 which
7 crushed Southern military power and ultimately sealed the fate of the Confederacy. Defeat on the battle-
8 field undermined the collective will of Southerners to fight on. Gettysburg and Vicksburg certainly
9 contributed to the outcome of the war but did not make the defeat of the South inevitable; the campaigns
10111 of 1864 did.
1
2 (b) In order to answer this question thoroughly it is necessary to examine changes in military strategy and
3 tactics, as well as the impact of technological innovation in weaponry.
4 The war has often been depicted as ‘the first modern war’ in the sense that it was mainly fought by
5 mass citizen armies rather than by professional soldiers, and involved the ‘mobilisation’ of civilian popu-
6 lations in production of armaments and supplies. The use of certain types of weapons and technological
7 innovations have also pointed to the conclusion that the war had much in common with the conflicts of
8 the next 60 years. The apparent modernity of the war should not however be exaggerated because rail-
9 roads (although on occasion proving vital as in the case of the 12,000 Confederate reinforcements moved
20111 to the First Battle of Bull Run) and telegraph wires could be put out of action and in reality communi-
1
cations on the battlefield continued to depend on horses to a great extent. There was also a tendency not
2
to take advantage of new inventions like the breech-loading rifle, and so the muzzle-loading musket, albeit
3
with a rifled barrel which improved range and accuracy, remained the basic weapon used by the infantry.
4
Other innovations such as the Gatling gun, submarine and underwater mine were too basic to have any
5
significant impact, but nevertheless warfare did change.
6
At the start of the war military thinking had largely failed to keep up with technological changes and
7
one reason for the high casualty rate, particularly early on in the war, was that although weapons had
8
changed tactics often had not. Strategically, generals tended to be affected by leaders from bygone eras.
9
Joseph Johnston’s ‘concentration and manoeuvre’ approach seems to have been influenced by Napoleon,
30
1 Jomini and Frederick the Great. Lee was more adaptable, like Washington or Wellington. Cavalry leader
2 Nathan Bedford Forrest unwittingly adopted Frederick the Great’s strategy of avoiding major battles.
3 Eighteenth-century and Napoleonic warfare had emphasised massed ranks and dense columns of infantry
4 in tight formations, moving and firing shoulder-to-shoulder in volleys, and tended to put the onus on
5 offence, with a bayonet attack expected to follow volleys of fire. Napoleon had used his artillery in conjunc-
6 tion with infantry attacks and similar tactics had been used successfully by US forces in the Mexican War
7 at a time when the main infantry weapon was the single-shot muzzle-loading smooth-bore musket, with
8 an effective range of about 80 yards and a maximum range of about 250 yards. Cannon fire could support
9 infantry as artillerymen were fairly safe from enemy fire at 200 yards away, and bayonet charges worked
40 because soldiers could cover 80 yards in the 20 or so seconds it took to reload. West Point Military Academy
1 stressed the tactical offensive, and thus, certainly at the start of the war, most officers believed the tactical
2 offensive of close-order infantry supported by artillery fire won battles. Few remembered the Duke of
3 Wellington’s acerbic comments regarding Napoleon’s tactics at Waterloo, ‘Damn me, the fellow’s just a
4 mere pounder after all’, or his attention to defence, attributing Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo to his poor
45 health. However, with the horrendous casualties sustained early on in the war, commanders gradually came
46 to realise the advantages an entrenched defensive position offered. George McClellan had studied and
47 witnessed the Crimean War and, despite having an army of 150,000 at his disposal, was acutely aware
48 of the risks of frontal assaults. There were rare examples of head-on assaults paying off, such as the
49222 Union victories at Missionary Ridge and Cedar Creek, and Confederate victories at Chancellorsville and
Chickamauga, but infantry formations gradually became more like skirmish lines, taking advantage of cover
to reload before rushing forward again, working in groups of two or three to load and shoot alternately.
This sort of attack was much more difficult to control and there were some officers who persisted with
close-order attacks. Loose-order tactics, despite being less costly, did not really move the advantage back
to the ‘tactical offensive’ against trenches and breastworks, and it became generally accepted that an attacking
force needed a 3:1 advantage to take an entrenched position. At Cold Harbor, in June 1864, Confederates
constructed fortified trenches over a six-mile front with artillery support. On one day Grant lost nearly
6,000 killed and wounded, and most of these were lost within one hour. This changed the war in the east
from one of manoeuvre to siege warfare.
Of casualties sustained in combat situations, about 80–90 per cent were inflicted by muskets and rifles
(a muzzle-loading rifle could be fired two to three times a minute). Rifling the barrel of a musket increased
its effective range four times to about 400–600 yards (it could kill at 1,000 yards). Few soldiers carried
rifles before the 1850s, although some of the best-known soldiers of the Napoleonic Wars, the 95th Rifles,
had carried them, effectively being used as skirmishers and snipers. The problems came from trying to ram
a conical bullet, large enough to ‘take’ the rifling, down the muzzle, and after a few shots the build-up of
powder residue had to be cleaned out of the grooves before it could be used again. In 1848 however a
French officer, Claude Minie, produced a bullet both small enough to be simply dropped down a rifled
barrel and the base of which expanded when fired thus filling the barrel, but it was expensive. James Burton
produced a cheaper and better bullet.
Ironically, it had been Jefferson Davis who, while Secretary of War in 1855, made the decision to arm
US soldiers with the .58 calibre Springfield rifled musket. This became the main infantry weapon of the
war, along with the similar British .577 calibre Enfield rifle, which took the same bullet and was used more
by the South (which had major difficulties producing its own). They were both muzzle-loading weapons
and single-shot but the better types of bullet meant that a well-trained soldier could fire it three times a
minute. Breech-loading rifles did exist in 1861 but were largely unreliable and even dangerous to the user.
Progress in this area did make the single-shot Sharps carbine and rifle favoured weapons with Union cavalry
and sharpshooter units and the development of metal cartridges (as opposed to paper-wrapped ones)
allowed the Union to arm its cavalry and some infantry with repeaters by 1863, of which the seven-shot
Spencer carbine was most successful. However, repeaters had a smaller powder charge and therefore shorter
range than paper-cartridged Springfield and Enfield weapons and were also more prone to misfiring, so
muzzle-loaders remained the main weapon used by infantry during the war.
In 1862 most Union regiments received new Springfields or Enfields while many Confederates were
still using smooth-bores. This was one reason for the 2:1 ratio of Confederate to Union casualties in the
Seven Days Battle. By 1863 virtually all infantrymen on both sides used rifles, making the bayonet redun-
dant. This had a major effect on casualty figures and strengthened the tactical defensive, but even after the
widespread adoption of rifled muskets generals continued to send close-order attacks with poor artillery
support. Given that the artillery guns now had to fire over longer ranges as well as the unreliability of shells,
artillery bombardments became less useful. Artillery guns were gradually rifled but as the terrain over
which many battles were fought was rugged forest their effectiveness was still limited. Nonetheless, artillery
could still be used effectively in defensive situations with grapeshot and canister against infantry. Rifled
weapons also allowed sharpshooters to pick out enemy officers almost at will, with the result that they
soon stopped riding horses and took to wearing uniforms like the privates. This partly explains why generals
in the war stood a 50 per cent greater chance of being killed than ordinary soldiers. For example, in May
1864 General Sedgewick in order to reassure his men than they could not be hit by Confederate sharp-
shooters would not take cover. His final words before being shot dead were: ‘They couldn’t hit an elephant
at this distance.’
The Civil War produced some legendary leaders of cavalry such as George Armstrong Custer for the
Union, and Nathan Bedford Forrest and J.E.B. Stuart for the Confederacy, even though it witnessed the
eclipse of the old-style cavalry charge and the sabre, as rifled weapons and explosive shells came to dominate
ESSAYS • 77
1111 the battlefield. Horsemen were, however, used successfully for scouting and reconnaissance, screening the
2111 movements of infantry, attacking the rear of an enemy, pursuing a retreat, and striking at weak points,
3 although the Union was slow to appreciate how useful cavalry could be. Initially all Union cavalry were
4111 under the command of Brigadier-General Cooke who was a poor leader. In addition McClellan resented
5 and distrusted the volunteer cavalry and would assign individual companies to infantry brigades where
6 they served primarily as messengers and orderlies rather than for scouting and screening where they could
7 have been much more effective. The poor use of cavalry probably cost McClellan the chance to destroy Lee
8 at Antietam, for they could have been used to delay Hill’s division from Harper’s Ferry, giving Burnside
9 more time to carry out his attack. On the bloodiest day of the war, McClellan’s cavalry suffered only 12
10111 casualties. Some have argued McClellan slowed down the development of cavalry by a year-and-a-half and
1 allowed Stuart’s cavalry to gain superiority in terms of morale and effectiveness. In desperation at Stuart’s
2 bold strikes Lincoln and his senior generals sought talented cavalry leaders regardless of previous rank or
3 age, while foreign mercenaries also came to hold high rank, at least until March 1863 when the Battle of
4 Kelly’s Ford was fought. It took Hooker to appreciate the value of cavalry and to use them effectively.
5 Having been let down, as he felt, by his cavalry commander Stoneman at Chancellorsville, he was replaced
6 in May by Brigadier-General Alfred Pleasonton who was ordered to attack a Confederate cavalry force
7 reported to be in the Culpepper area near the Rappahannock river. This led to the Battle of Brandy Station,
8 the biggest cavalry battle of the war. At Brandy Station in June 1863 the myth of Stuart’s cavalry was
9 shattered and they came close to defeat, even though the Confederates finally won the encounter. Brigadier-
20111 General John Buford had skilfully used his cavalry as mobile infantry using their breech-loading carbines
1 rather than employing the shock tactics of charge and sabre. The Battle of Brandy Station was effectively
2 where the sabre became obsolete. Never again could Confederates simply write-off the Union cavalry.
3 (It has been suggested that Stuart wanted to raid behind enemy lines to restore his reputation prior to
4 Gettysburg, but it meant Lee lost contact with him and hence lost his scouting skills, leaving Lee unaware
5 of Meade’s closeness.)
6 One of the most enduring incidents of the war was the battle between the ironclad ships, the USS
7 Monitor and CSS Virginia (Merrimac), on 9 March 1862, following which naval warfare was changed forever.
8 By the end of the war, the Union had built or started 58 ships of the same class as the Monitor. Other inno-
9 vations included marine torpedoes (mines) and even submarine warfare. The sinking of the Housatonic, a
30 Union battleship, was carried out by the Hunley, a Confederate submarine, in February 1864, but the Hunley
1 itself went down soon afterwards. Confederate torpedoes sank or badly damaged over 40 Northern ships.
2 Brigadier-General Raines’ land mines certainly slowed the Union advance up the peninsula but caused
3 outrage on both sides. The gathering of more accurate military intelligence had been facilitated by Jack
4 LaMountain’s balloons which first appeared over Hampton Roads in the summer of 1861. In turn aerial
5 reconnaissance by balloon led to camouflage and ‘anti-aircraft’ fire with Colonel Alexander of the CSA
6 elevating his artillery. The widespread appearance of journalists and photographers on the battlefield was
7 something new, as was the use of elaborate intelligence units.
8
9
1
4 (a) Assess the significance of the fall of Vicksburg for the Confederate cause. (30)
2
3 (b) How important was the battle of Gettysburg to the outcome of the war? (60)
4 (OCR)
45
46 Advice: Both parts expect you to be able to assess the importance of two key events during the war. For Part
47 (a) you will need to assess the importance of Vicksburg from both strategic and psychological perspectives, as
48 well as measuring it against other issues; and for Part (b) it may be worth considering the argument that the
49222 significance of Gettysburg has been overstated, while again measuring it against other issues.
5 (a) How far did cavalry tactics change during the Civil War? (30)
(b) ‘Modern weapons, outdated tactics.’ How valid is this verdict on the nature of warfare
during the American Civil War? (60)
(OCR)
Essay plan
Part (a)
Introduction: Indicate general line of argument to be followed, i.e. cavalry tactics appear to have changed
significantly, with brief ideas as to why.
Para 1: Outline general cavalry tactics employed before the Civil War.
Para 2: Examine the factors that led to changes in tactics, e.g. rifles which could be fired more frequently,
and strong defences.
Para 3: Outline how the use of cavalry changed, e.g. charges replaced by scouting, and cavalry fighting on
foot. Also, contrast early success of Southern cavalry against McClellan’s reluctance to employ his.
Conclusion: The extent to which cavalry tactics changed.
Part (b)
Introduction: Comment on quote with some degree of agreement/disagreement expressed.
Para 1: Examine influences on tactics going into the war, particularly Napoleonic.
Para 2: Consider tactics employed in the early stages of the war, and link to para 3.
Para 3: Assess the greater accuracy and efficiency of weapons used in the war and the implications they
had for tactical changes. Remember to consider the limitations of such innovations as submarine
warfare.
Para 4: Analyse how tactics changed or did not change during the war, e.g. increasing use of entrenched
positions to counter increased firepower, and the resulting tendency to change attacking forma-
tions.
Conclusion: Try to avoid great generalisations on the modernity of weapons and the unwillingness to modify
tactics before making a final decision on the quote.
Northern resources and Presidential leadership
6 (a) To what extent did the North win the war because of its superior resources and larger
population? (30)
(b) To what extent was Abraham Lincoln a better wartime leader than Jefferson Davis? (60)
(OCR)
(a) It is certainly true to say that the North had superior resources during the war and was able to out-
produce the South substantially in terms of weapons, ammunition and supplies. It has been argued that
the longer the war went on the better the chance the North had of winning because of its ‘big battalions’.
But Northern opinion was divided, volatile and impatient, and the longer the war went on the greater
ESSAYS • 79
1111 the chance of disillusion and war weariness setting in, which could seriously undermine the will of the
2111 North to fight on. Military historians will also point out that strategy, tactics and bad decisions in the heat
3 of the moment on the battlefield were always likely to have as much impact on the outcome of the war as
4111 anything else.
5 Any neutral considering the war today, were it not for the issue of slavery, would probably side with
6 the Confederacy, which was clearly the underdog. Eighty per cent of the nation’s factories were in the North,
7 along with the country’s main supply of meat and grain, banking resources, and shipping and shipbuilding.
8 Compared with the South, 15 times as much iron was produced in the North, 38 times as much coal and
9 27 times as much in woollen goods. On top of all that the North had a population of 22 million against
10111 about 9.5 million in the South, nearly 4 million of whom were slaves and so unlikely to fight. The North
1 could therefore effectively be self-sufficient in war materials while the South had to rely heavily on
2 Europe. It has however been argued that, because the South had so many slaves working, a higher propor-
3 tion of men of military age were freed up to fight than in the North but at the end of the day the North
4 could afford to lose more men than the South, and Grant knew it. It is worth noting that Lee actually lost
5 more of his men per battle than any other general in the war, which must raise serious questions about
6 Southern strategy and tactics. It is also significant that Chickamauga Creek was the only major battle at
7 which Union troops were outnumbered by Confederate forces. It has been suggested that the South did
8 have sufficient guns by the end of the war, but not enough men to use them. This is borne out by the deci-
9 sion to allow black slaves to fight in the Confederate army, although the plan never came into effect, and
20111 highlights the difference in population numbers between the sides. Brogan has argued: ‘only Robert E. Lee’s
1 idea, of unrelenting brilliant battle, with the object of breaking the Northern will to go on fighting,
2 offered any hope . . .’ This again emphasises that the South was always up against numbers. By the end of
3 the war one in three Southerners of military age had died as a result of the war. It was a wonder the South
4 held out as long as it did, given that by the end of 1862 much of Tennessee had been lost, New Orleans,
5 the major port, had gone, as had Norfolk, Virginia’s major port, while the key ports of Charleston,
6 Mobile and Savannah had been blockaded, the border states had remained loyal and no foreign countries
7 had given support.
8 Several historians have concentrated on internal factors that they believe ultimately lost the South the
9 war, rather than focusing on the North’s resources. David Donald in 1995 argued that the South ‘died
30 of democracy’, suggesting that Davis never managed to sufficiently centralise the war effort, or to override
1 the selfish motives of certain Confederate states. Tulloch has suggested that the Confederacy might have
2 collapsed from within, that Southern taxes and inflation were borne more heavily by the poor and that, as
3 the war progressed, morale declined and soldiers became less inclined to fight a war for the rich. Gallagher
4 has not detected a demoralised Southern army nor resentment among the poor for fighting a rich man’s
5 war, and McPherson is also convinced that it was military failure rather than low civilian morale which
6 proved decisive. Brogan has suggested that the existence of 22,000 miles of railway allowed the North to
7 move men and supplies very effectively and neutralised the South’s interior lines of communications (there
8 were only 9,000 miles of line in the South, which became a strategic weakness). It has been suggested that
9 the South could have achieved independence had it not been for its inability to replace damaged track and
40 rolling stock. As the war progressed it became very difficult to get food to soldiers and civilians while
1 the Northern economy simply grew stronger.
2 Northern naval strength was also a crucial factor. In the South there was not a shipyard capable of
3 building a modern warship at the start of the war. Confederate Naval Secretary Stephen R. Mallory realised
4 that the outdated Union navy was vulnerable to far-ranging commerce raiders and ironclad rams, which
45 might be purchased in Europe, thereby allowing cotton exports to continue. The Confederate Navy
46 Department showed great ingenuity, for example using Southern engineers to build ‘torpedoes’ (mines).
47 The CSS Virginia (or Merrimac), in its first outing at Hampton Roads, sank a Union boat with its ram and
48 11 guns while shells and shot bounced off its armour plating, although the Union’s ironclad USS Monitor
49222 quickly appeared to neutralise its threat. However, the North could produce ram ships more quickly than
and in larger numbers than South might get them in Europe. It was also difficult for Richmond to raise
the money to buy ships from abroad (two commerce raiders which sank a number of US boats were built
for the Confederacy in Liverpool in 1862). Davis did not seem to understand the importance of sea power
and made a big mistake in not supporting his naval aides more than he did. Nor did Davis understand
international politics, hoping that Britain would intervene in the war at a time when Britain was more
concerned about France. At the time there was a surplus of cotton in Britain so the Southern strategy of
keeping cotton did not work, when it could have been sold abroad and used to buy materials. The fact that
external aid failed to materialise was crucial.
From an economic point of view, the South struggled. The Confederate Congress was slow to raise
taxes and much capital was tied up in land and slaves, which meant there was little available to purchase
war bonds. The Congress began a process of issuing Treasury notes that could be redeemed in gold or silver
after the war, but the notes declined in value with each successive issue, and by early 1863 it cost $8 to buy
what $1 would have bought at the beginning of the war. By the last year of the war the value of the
Confederate dollar was only worth 2 per cent of its 1860 value or 1 US cent. Proportionately the Confederacy
raised 60 per cent of its revenue by printing paper money, under 40 per cent through loans, and less than
10 per cent through taxes. The South increased its money supply by 60 per cent compared to the North’s
13 per cent. Stanley Lebergott blames this disastrous financial policy on the planters who often seemed to
be more concerned with maintaining profit margins and refused to switch production to food when urged
to by the Confederate Congress. The North raised 66 per cent of is revenue through war bonds, about 20
per cent through taxes, 13 per cent by printing Treasury notes (‘greenbacks’), which were legal tender rather
than to be redeemed, and avoided the crippling inflation of the South. It has been argued, particularly by
Douglas Ball, that the failure of the South could largely be attributed to its financial policies, but higher
taxes could also have been counter-productive, as with the 10 per cent tax on agricultural produce, which
resulted in many farmers hiding crops and animals, or refusing to plant. The Confederate government did
direct production and distribution, playing a greater role than Lincoln in economic affairs (although greater
intervention with the railroads, which were owned by more than 100 companies and operated different
gauges, would have been useful). Controlled blockade-running however was remarkably successful, with
runners having about a 75 per cent chance of getting through until the last month of the war. Blockade-
running was responsible for bringing in 60 per cent of small arms, 30 per cent of lead, 75 per cent of
saltpetre and most of the paper for cartridges.
By the winter of 1863 the South was suffering serious economic problems, the escape of slaves and
occupation of some its prime agricultural areas. Much land had been converted to food production but
the railroads were in a poor state and food was scarce. This problem was exacerbated by the April 1862
draft, which took many farmers aged 18–35 from the land, as they were unable to pay the cost of hiring a
substitute. To have won the war, the South would have had to follow up early victories at Bull Run and
Wilson’s Creek with a decisive strike, but strategy was more defensively-minded at the time. Ultimately the
loss of men, land and privations suffered by civilians could not be sustained and surrender negotiations
were opened by Lee and Johnston before guerrilla action gained momentum. Ultimately military events
were crucial and Grant in the east understood all too well that the North could afford to lose more men
than the South.
(b) Maldwyn Jones has argued that ‘Lincoln more than anyone . . . saved the Union’, but, as President,
he was initially hesitant and overestimated the strength of Southern Unionism, which he had expected to
reassert itself following secession. In the first half of the war he failed to give his generals his full confi-
dence and tended to intervene unhelpfully. Fortunately his political sense was far sharper and he knew
when to act decisively in that sphere. Lincoln also had certain advantages over Davis in that he took
control of a government system that had been functioning since the Constitution, whereas Davis had to
start from nothing, although he did have the experience of cabinet office and greater military experience
behind him.
ESSAYS • 81
1111 Despite Lincoln’s limited military service in the state militia, he proved to be the North’s most
2111 important military commander according to Brinkley and eventually found a chief of staff in Grant who
3 shared his belief that continual fighting and making enemy armies the target would pay off. He shaped
4111 a national strategy of unconditional surrender and although some of his choices of commanders were
5 criticised on purely military grounds, they often made sense in terms of pacifying different parts of the
6 North and factions in Congress. He certainly appeared to change his generals too frequently, but once he
7 was convinced of Grant’s abilities he stayed with him (Grant was his ninth general in charge). However,
8 recent evidence suggests Lincoln offered the command of the Northern forces to Giuseppe Garibaldi, unifier
9 of Italy, in 1862, demonstrating his lack of faith in American generals.
10111 Davis had been to West Point, gained military experience in the Mexican War and been Secretary of
1 War in the US government, all of which Brogan believes gave him a vastly inflated opinion of his own mili-
2 tary abilities. For much of the war he planned strategy alone, not appreciating the need for a supreme
3 military commander. His appointment of Lee was clearly a good one and he certainly gave freedom to the
4 generals he trusted, but he has been accused of interfering too much with military affairs. His feuds with
5 top generals Beauregard and Johnston undoubtedly damaged the war effort, as did his stubborn decisions
6 to stick with the incompetent Braxton Bragg and Lucius Northrop. It has been suggested that the South
7 mobilised with amazing speed at the start of the war, which has to be to Davis’s credit. But another mark
8 against Davis is the argument that the eastern theatre got the bulk of soldiers and munitions and that he
9 failed to see the war would be won and lost in the west. Beauregard argued that Davis was too defensive,
20111 Johnston argued that he was too offensively-minded, while Davis blamed Johnston for the loss of Vicksburg
1
– although others have since suggested that the ambiguous command structure in the west was really to
2
blame, with Confederate armies organised into departments under different generals making coordination
3
and cooperation difficult at times. On balance therefore it would seem that as a strategist and and as a
4
day-to-day leader of military operations Lincoln was more effective.
5
In terms of their ability to lead and to communicate, Lincoln again seems to have had the edge on
6
Davis. Lincoln could be ruthless: holding men without trial (over 13,000 arrests were made in the North
7
during the war), taking action without Congressional approval such as sending troops into battle, increasing
8
the size of the army, setting up a naval blockade, and even considering arresting Chief Justice Taney when
9
he ruled the President had exceeded his power. As he gave the Gettysburg Address, his soldiers apparently
30
1 guarded the polls at a state election in Delaware to ensure a Republican victory. It should also be remem-
2 bered that the Emancipation Proclamation was of dubious legality, although it proved to be an inspired
3 move. Davis’s Vice-President, Stephens, thought Davis ‘weak, timid, petulant, peevish, obstinate’ and
4 blamed him for virtually all that went wrong. Davis certainly failed to establish a good working relation-
5 ship with many, and experienced a relatively high cabinet turnover, getting through four secretaries of state
6 and six secretaries of war, although much of the turnover was due to criticism from Congress. To his credit,
7 Davis did defend many of his colleagues and left cabinet members to get on with their jobs generally.
8 Confederate government functioned fairly smoothly, although Davis found it hard to prioritise and dele-
9 gate, was often indecisive and got bogged down in debate. His critics at the time called him despotic, but
40 historians tend to argue that he should have used more power, as Lincoln did (David Donald arguing that
1 the South ‘died of democracy’), for example to nationalise the railroads, and that he was too lenient with
2 press criticisms and opponents. He suspended habeas corpus only under Congressional authority, but he
3 was behind the 1862 Conscription Act, and used martial law in areas under threat from invasion. He also
4 urged high taxes on land, cotton and slaves, and towards the end of the war was prepared to support the
45 recruitment of slaves into the Confederate army despite opposition.
46 Lincoln appears to have been better at communicating with people, and keeping factions together. The
47 work of Chase in finance and Seward in foreign policy demonstrates that Lincoln picked better subordin-
48 ates and knew how to delegate. He managed his cabinet well and listened to a range of viewpoints to ensure
49222 widespread support within the party. His political timing was superb. Davis showed a lack of humour and
inflexibility, was proud and sensitive to criticism, although he was known for his honesty and loyalty,
tending to stand by unpopular individuals and decisions. He also seems to have been a good public speaker.
Both leaders had problems with internal opponents. Lincoln had the Joint Committee on the Conduct
of the War to hide behind where necessary, although he was usually happy to take the tough decisions.
He was generally supported by Northern opinion, for example over the removal of McClellan and Buell.
There was, however, dissension in the North over the aims of the war, from within the Republican ranks
as well as from the Democrat ‘Copperheads’, who appeared to want peace as a priority. From Davis’s
point of view it is now contended that the very absence of political parties in the Confederate Congress
was a problem for him because it meant that congressmen and governors could be much more indepen-
dent, and not subject to party discipline, which could have created greater unity – as it did with the
Republicans and Lincoln. In the North, the fact that opposition came from the Democrats meant that the
Republicans became more unified, outwardly at least, and worked to discredit the Democrats. McPherson
says that the South had no such institutionalised political structure to galvanise support for the war effort
and discredit dissenters, but he concludes that internal divisions neutralised this factor. In the 1863
Congressional elections Southerners who had opposed secession in 1861 won votes, and of the 137 members,
40 per cent were new, many of them opposed to Davis. Of 26 senators in the new House, 12 were oppo-
nents, for a range of reasons: for example, states’ rights, strategy, peace and returning to the Union. Davis
became increasingly dependent on the support of congressmen from areas under Union control, many of
which had not been able to hold elections in 1863. On balance it looks as if state obstructionism weakened
the Southern military effort, and Frank Owsley has claimed that the Confederacy ‘died of state rights’.
Davis was certainly hampered by the individualism of the planter class, and particular problems with
Vice-President Stephens as well as the governors of Georgia and North Carolina, who did not want to
send troops to fight away from their states. However, most states were extremely loyal. Lincoln too had his
problems. The New York City draft riots in July 1863 resulted in 1,000 people being killed or wounded,
and serious opposition from the Democrats in 1864 meant that his popular majority of 400,000 in a poll
of over 4 million was far from convincing. In addition, over 120,000 Northerners avoided the draft and
200,000 deserted.
David Potter, in 1960, pointed to Davis as the key reason the Confederacy lost, and others have sug-
gested that had Lincoln led the South and Davis the North the result of the war could have been different,
although that seems overstated. Robert E. Lee said no one could have led the South better than Davis, and
historian Alan Farmer says it was the leadership of Davis that ensured the South held out as long as it did.
Davis was probably the best man for the job in the South, but ultimately he was up against a consummate
political leader who would rank among the greatest ever. On balance, Lincoln was a more effective wartime
leader than Davis.
PRACTICE QUESTION
7 (a) Why was it so important to Lincoln that the border states did not secede? (30)
(b) ‘The South never stood a chance.’ To what extent was the outcome of the war a
foregone conclusion? (60)
(OCR)
Advice: Part (a) requires a good understanding of the geographical significance of the states, in terms of
Washington and defence, as well as the importance of the states’ populations and resources. A Part (b) answer
should look at the chances the South had for victory, for example, striking quickly and winning a succession of
early victories, or holding out over a long period of time in the hope that, in the North, war weariness would
set in. The advantages held by the South should also be considered, particularly the idea that to win the war
the North had to effectively conquer the South, whereas the South had only to not lose.
ESSAYS • 83
1111
2111 Southern strategy and advantages, and military leadership
3
4111 8 (a) To what extent was the South’s strategy flawed? (30)
5
6 (b) ‘Robert E. Lee was the most able Confederate military leader of the Civil War.’
7 Discuss. (60)
8 (OCR)
9
10111 (a) Davis may have been inclined to fight a guerrilla-type war but felt duty-bound to defend the whole of
1 the Confederacy rather than sacrificing certain bits of it, which could certainly have weakened morale
2 and resources. The South in general also tended to feel it could take on the Yankees and beat them in
3 battle.
4 Davis’s strategy has become known as ‘offensive-defensive’, although it was never clearly defined, and
5 seemed to emerge over a period of time based on events. It was supposed to depend essentially on defence,
6 but counter-attacks would be carried out where appropriate. In reality, Davis built up resources and supplies
7 and took the initiative when the situation offered, and except for a few significant offensive actions his
8 strategy effectively became one of passive and dispersed defence, ultimately weakening the Confederacy.
9 The lack of a coordinated defensive strategy was a fatal weakness. Beauregard argued that Davis was too
20111 defensive, but given that the North had to militarily defeat the Confederate armies, conquer the geograph-
1 ical obstacles and occupy vast areas of the South to win the war, some have suggested that a defensive
2 strategy of French General Antoine Jomini – ‘the space and time defence’ – would have worked. In other
3 words, the South could actually have drawn Northern forces further South thus stretching Northern lines
4 of communication which would then have been vulnerable to attack. In turn the Union would have been
5 forced to deploy more troops to guard the supply lines, thereby reducing the strength of the main attacking
6 army. In turn, the South would not have needed such large armies as the army of northern Virginia or the
7 army of Tennessee to take on the reduced Northern forces. For example Sherman’s dependence on the
8 Western and Atlantic Railroad, which he initially guarded with 20,000 men, could have been exploited
9 during his Atlanta campaign.
30 Johnston was certainly skilful enough to avoid being drawn into a major battle. At one point he asked
1 Davis to place all available cavalry under Forrest’s command so they could attack Sherman’s communica-
2 tions. Lee later supported the plan but Davis refused to implement it, which may have helped save Atlanta
3 or at least delayed its fall, with a resulting impact on Lincoln’s re-election and the war. It is also contended
4 that civilian morale in the South could have withstood allowing Northerners deeper into the South, although
5 Davis was not prepared to take the risk. He seemed to regard Vicksburg of great symbolic importance for
6 morale, and referred to it as ‘the nail head that held the South’s two halves together’, but in reality there
7 was relatively little trade between the western and eastern parts of the South, and the Union, once Vicksburg
8 was taken, had to use huge numbers to keep control of the Mississippi. As it was, Grant’s supply line was
9 very nearly destroyed by Forrest and van Dorn in his advance on Vicksburg. Despite Davis valuing
40 Vicksburg, he has been criticised for not seeing that the war would be won and lost in the west rather than
1 the east, and for persisting in sending more troops and supplies the way of Lee. The fall of Kentucky gave
2 the Union the Ohio river, which was of great strategic significance.
3 Johnston criticised Davis for being dangerously offensive and ultimately self-defeating. Grade
4 McWhiney and Perry Jamieson have supported this view by arguing the Confederacy ‘bled itself to death’
45 in the first three years of the war, pointing out that in 8 of the first 12 big battles of the war the Confederate
46 forces attacked, and lost 97,000 men, compared to 77,000 Northerners. They attribute this in part to the
47 Celtic origins of many Southerners and the cultural tradition of the frontal charge. It is perhaps in the east
48 where this criticism is best exemplified. Lee was convinced that only defeats inflicted against Northerners
49222 on their own land would increase the pressure on Lincoln sufficiently to let the South go, and he may have
been right. Others have argued that Lee tended to think and fight as a Virginian first and foremost and did
not fully appreciate the need to develop an overall strategy.
It could be argued that the South pursued the wrong strategy, placing too much faith on being able
to defend the Mississippi river with large fortifications, and being too ambitious in attempting to invade
the North, resulting in Antietam and Gettysburg, both of which came to be regarded not just as military
victories but political victories for Lincoln. In addition, there seems to have been a confused command
structure in the west, no detailed strategy for controlling Kentucky, as well as the failure to achieve a
successful alliance with foreign nations, which meant that gradually Northern blockades reduced the South’s
seaborne trade to less than a third of its normal level.
(b) It has been argued that when Lee died in 1870 he was considered second to Jackson in terms of
ability, but then former members of his staff set about raising his profile by criticising General Longstreet,
particularly blaming him for not attacking at the hour Lee had specified at Gettysburg. Lee has since achieved
an almost iconic status with Southerners and Northerners alike, but does his great and untarnished
reputation stand up to scrutiny?
There are certainly a number of Confederate leaders who can give Lee a run for his money. Joseph
Johnston, for example, was admired by his opponents more than by his own President. Grant said Johnston
gave him ‘more anxiety than any of the others’ and Sherman described him as ‘the most enterprising’ of
all the Southern generals. It has been suggested Johnston based his ‘concentration and manoeuvre’ strategy
very much on the ideas of Napoleon, Jomini and Frederick the Great. Johnston believed that the
Confederacy could not be defended everywhere against Union encroachments and that it was better to give
ground where necessary and to concentrate forces to fight against the main Union armies. He would have
given up Vicksburg for the sake of the Confederacy and used Pemberton’s troops to fight with others.
However, Davis was unwilling to do that. Johnston’s critics have maintained that he was defensively-minded,
but evidence suggests that he often did not have the numbers or the right position for a bolder strategy.
While he was in Virginia he had actually asked Davis for more men so he could take the initiative and
invade the North, but Davis’s response to this request in October 1861 was to approve a number of partial
operations against the North rather than an invasion. In April 1862, Johnston again raised the issue
of a major offensive against the North, arguing that he could not compete with McClellan in terms of
engineering and artillery.
Thomas J. Jackson earned his nickname ‘Stonewall’ following the refusal of his Virginia brigade to
budge at the First Battle of Bull Run. His Shenandoah campaign showed great flare, as he managed to win
four battles against three separate Union armies, which outnumbered him by two to one. His accidental
death was a loss that could never be replaced, and Lee always thought that, had he had Jackson at Gettysburg,
the outcome could have been different. Jackson, despite some rather odd personal habits, certainly possessed
military genius, but his war was probably too short to fairly judge him against Lee.
Shelby Foote has championed the cause of Nathan Bedford Forrest, who he has described as ‘a natural
genius’. Sherman called him the most remarkable man the war produced, given that he rose from private
to lieutenant-general, had 30 horses shot from under him and apparently killed 31 men in hand-to-hand
combat. Forrest, as a commander of cavalry, however, cannot be compared to Lee fairly.
In the early part of the war, Lee earned the nicknames ‘King of Spades’ and ‘Granny Lee’ for his digging
of entrenchments around Richmond. He also suffered setbacks in the east. Stuart Reid has praised Lee’s
defensive qualities, but doubted his attacking capabilities – calling Pickett’s charge at Gettysburg ‘a serious
error’ – and his ability to control his subordinates such as J.E.B. Stuart at Gettysburg.
Fuller and Liddell Hart have argued that Lee threw victory away by being too offensive and suffering
excessive casualties, which could not be sustained, and for failing to adapt to new conditions. McWhiney
and Jamieson have contended that the Confederacy bled itself to death in the first three years of the
war by being too offensive. McPherson has also argued that, although Lee’s daring won battles, it lost
ESSAYS • 85
1111 the war, as a more cautious approach could have been more successful. Foote suggests that, following a
2111 series of brilliant victories, Lee came to believe in his own invincibility and that of his army; and at
3 Gettysburg that was his doom. He judges Pickett’s charge a terrible mistake, with Lee overestimating his
4111 men, and declining the advice of Longstreet who warned against an attack. Lee has also been accused of
5 limiting his vision to the eastern theatre where he concentrated resources at the expense of the west, which
6 is ultimately where the war was lost. It should be remembered too that Lee had the highest losses of all
7 army commanders with a 20 per cent casualty rate. However, he was working within a defective command
8 structure, received poor intelligence and often had subordinates letting him down, particularly Jackson
9 failing to carry out instructions. He also had his own problems: his son was held for ransom, and he had
10111 to contend with heart trouble.
1 McPherson feels that Lee deserves to be regarded as the best tactician of the war. He created the army
2 of northern Virginia, the finest fighting force of the war. Gary Gallagher suggests Davis and Lee’s offensive/
3 defensive approach was the best option. Brogan has praised Lee’s idea of ‘unrelenting brilliant battle’ as
4 the only real hope the South had. Farmer feels Lee should be held in high regard and that without his lead-
5 ership the South would have lost sooner. He boosted Southern morale and managed to damage Northern
6 morale. It can also be argued that it was unlikely concentrating more resources in the west would have
7 made much difference to the war’s outcome. Lee won some brilliant victories against great odds, and for
8 these alone he deserves to be regarded as the Confederacy’s most able military leader.
9
20111 9 (a) Assess the extent of the geographical advantages the South had against Northern
1 invasion. (30)
2
3 (b) How far was the North better led militarily and politically than the South? (60)
4 (OCR)
5
6
Essay plan
7
8 Part (a)
9 Introduction: Comment on the sheer size of the South, which would be difficult to occupy, but make the
30 point that in the end Lincoln and Grant realised that destroying Confederate armies in the field
1 was the key to victory.
2
3 Para 1: Analyse the significance of the extensive Southern coastline.
4 Para 2: Look at Southern rivers flowing west to east.
5
6 Para 3: Consider mountains, the Shenandoah valley leading away from Richmond, dense forests and
7 swampy land.
8 Para 4: Consider the limitations of the geographical advantages and how the North might exploit geograph-
9
ical features, e.g. the significance of Ohio and Mississippi rivers.
40
1 Conclusion: How far geography worked in favour of the South.
2
3 Part (b)
4 Introduction: Discuss the extent to which political and military leadership were intertwined, given that the
45 rival Presidents both took a leading role in military decision-making.
46
47 Para 1: Assess advantages Lincoln held over Davis from the outset.
48 Para 2: Examine the success that Lincoln and Davis had in military affairs.
49222
Para 3: Consider the abilities of both men to inspire support and communicate, and how they dealt with
opponents.
Para 4: Look at generals in the field of both sides and consider the reputations of Lee, Johnston, Jackson
and Stuart, for example, against those of Grant, Sherman, McClellan and Meade.
Conclusion: This could be split in the sense that a verdict could be reached of superior Southern military
leadership against better Northern political leadership, but it could be a verdict totally in favour
of the North.
Part 3: Sources
1 Emancipation
■ Source A: Lincoln speaking to Christian ministers from Chicago in September 1862
I admit that slavery is the root of the rebellion . . . I would also concede that emancipation would help us
in Europe, and convince them that we are incited by something more than ambition . . . And then unques-
tionably it would weaken the rebels by drawing off their laborers . . . But I am not sure we could do much
with the blacks. If we were to arm them, I fear that in a few weeks the arms would be in the hands of the
rebels . . . I will mention another thing . . . There are fifty thousand bayonets in the Union armies from
the Border Slave States. It would be a serious matter if, in consequence of a proclamation such as you
desire, they should go over to the rebels.
■ Source B: Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, November 1862
With their armies baffled and beaten, and with the standards of the rebel army again within sight
of Washington, the President has at length owned the impossibility of success in fair warfare, and seeks to
paralyse the victorious armies of the South by letting loose upon their hearths and homes the lust and
savagery of four million Negroes . . . henceforth it is a war of extermination. The North seeks to make
of the South a desert – a wilderness of bloodshed and misery; for thus only, now, does it or can it hope to
overcome the seceding Confederacy.
■ Source C: Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, 1 January 1863
That . . . all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall
then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free . . . [and] will
be received into the armed service of the United States . . .
■ Source D: Letter to General US Grant from Abraham Lincoln, 9 August 1863
. . . Gen. Thomas has gone again to the Mississippi valley, with the view of raising colored troops . . .
I believe it is a resource which, if vigorously applied now, will soon close the contest. It works doubly,
weakening the enemy and strengthening us.
SOURCES • 87

2111
4111
(a) Study Source C. From this Source and your own knowledge explain exactly which slaves
5
would be freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. (20)
6
7 (b) Study Sources A and D. How far do Lincoln’s sentiments in Source D agree with the views
8 he expresses in Source A? (40)
9
(c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain why
10111
Lincoln changed his attitude towards emancipation during the war. (60)
1
2 (a) Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation is very carefully worded. It refers to those slaves in parts of
3 the South that were still in a state of rebellion on 1 January 1863. In other words, those slaves in parts
4 of the South which had already been occupied by Northern troops would not be freed, and neither would
5 those slaves in the four border states that had remained loyal to the Union from the start of the war. The
6 Emancipation Proclamation therefore freed no slaves at all. It did, however, set out Lincoln’s intent to free
7 slaves in areas subsequently ‘liberated’.
8
9 (b) In Source D Lincoln makes the point that the emancipation of slaves ‘doubly’ benefits the North, i.e.
20111 the loss of slaves weakens the enemy, and then, when the ex-slaves join the Union army, it also helps the
1 North. This supports the views in Source A to a certain extent, but only as far as Lincoln thought that
2 losing labourers would weaken the South. In Source A he does not really believe there will be a double
3 benefit to the North, saying ‘I am not sure we could do much with the blacks’, and clearly does not feel
4 they would make good soldiers.
5
6 (c) From the time that the states of the Lower South seceded Lincoln had to play things very cautiously.
7 If he made the abolition of slavery an aim of war straight away, he could lose the Upper South, the border
8 slave states, and also divide opinion in the North. As it was, the Upper South seceded anyway, but the
9 fact that Lincoln did not make the abolition of slavery a war aim probably saved the Union and brought
30 about the emancipation of slaves. Some historians have been convinced that Lincoln all along wanted to
1 free the slaves but was simply waiting for the right moment. By September 1862 when he spoke to Christian
2 ministers he was probably convinced that the abolition of slavery would happen, although his justification
3 for the act outlined in Source A suggest that it was important to him people should think he wanted to
4 free the slaves as a way of winning the war and saving the Union, rather than it becoming an aim in itself.
5 He also, to a certain extent, was outlining why it would make sense at that time to free the slaves, to
6 ‘convince them’ in Europe, and to ‘weaken the rebels’, but he still appears to be cautious, including the
7 proviso that ‘fifty thousand bayonets . . . from the Border Slave States’ may be lost if slaves in the rebel
8 states were freed.
9 Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine (Source B) clearly viewed Lincoln’s intention to let loose ‘the lust
40 and savagery of four million Negroes’ in a very cynical and desperate light, suggesting that without freeing
1 the slaves Lincoln’s armies could well have been facing defeat. But it was especially to avoid the appear-
2 ance of desperation that Lincoln waited until after Antietam, which he chose to regard as a Union victory,
3 before issuing his proclamation. The Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 was so carefully worded (‘slaves
4 within any state . . . in rebellion against the United States’) that it actually freed no slaves at all, and
45 this reveals Lincoln as the great pragmatist. He did not intend to free slaves in the border states or the
46 occupied states of the South, thereby ensuring continued loyalty from these areas. Source D reveals how
47 Lincoln had come round to the idea of ‘raising colored troops’ for the Union army, and although initially
48 reluctant to use them in combat situations, he gradually relented, and allowed black regiments to play their
49222 part in the winning of the war.
Lincoln could probably not have risked the Emancipation Proclamation earlier. He had to wait until
war weariness and casualty rates in the North made the freeing of the slaves an acceptable aim for the
majority of whites. Once that time had come, Lincoln could see the advantages of giving the Northern
cause more impetus by adopting a nobler cause than simply safeguarding the Union.

(a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain why Lincoln was so
concerned about the ‘fifty thousand bayonets . . . from the Border Slave States’. (20)
(b) Study Sources B and D. How far does Source D support the motives ascribed to Lincoln
in Source B? (40)
(c) Using these Sources and your own knowledge explain how far you support the view that
Lincoln did not go to war to abolish slavery. (60)
2 Leadership during the war
■ Source A: Extracts from letters written by Abraham Lincoln to General George B. McClellan,
October 1862
You remember my speaking to you of what I called your over-cautiousness. Are you not over-cautious
when you assume that you can not do what the enemy is constantly doing?
I have just read your despatch about sore tongued and fatigued horses. Will you pardon me for asking
what the horses of your army have done since the battle of Antietam that fatigue anything?
■ Source B: Abraham Lincoln’s proclamation suspending the writ of habeas corpus,

24 September 1862
. . . disloyal persons are not adequately restrained by the ordinary processes of law . . . from giving aid and
comfort in various ways to the insurrection . . . therefore, be it ordered . . . That the Writ of Habeas Corpus
is suspended in respect to all persons arrested . . .
■ Source C: Order of Retaliation, 30 July 1863 (Abraham Lincoln’s response to the

Confederacy executing or selling into slavery captured black soldiers)
It is . . . ordered that for every soldier of the United States killed in violation of the laws of war, a rebel
soldier shall be executed.
■ Source D: Letter from Abraham Lincoln to General U.S. Grant, 30 April 1864
. . . I wish to express, in this way, my entire satisfaction with what you have done up to this time . . . The
particulars of your plans I neither know, or seek to know . . . I wish not to obtrude any constraints or
restraints upon you.
SOURCES • 89

2111
4111
5 (a) Study Source B. From this Source and your own knowledge explain why the ‘Writ of
6 Habeas Corpus’ was suspended by Lincoln in 1862. (20)
7 (b) Study Sources A and D. How far do Lincoln’s sentiments expressed in Sources A
8 and D appear to represent a contradiction in terms of how he dealt with senior
9 army officers? (40)
10111
1 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all the Sources and your own knowledge explain the extent
2 to which Lincoln expanded the powers of the President during wartime. (60)
3
4 (a) Lincoln, invoking his war powers as commander-in-chief, decided that the ordinary laws and courts
5 were not effective enough against those who in some way aided and abetted the rebel cause. The problems
6 of bringing charges that stuck are made apparent by his decision to suspend the right of habeas corpus (i.e.
7 to be charged with an offence or released) ‘in respect to all persons arrested’, so that traitors to the Union
8 could be held in prison indefinitely without being charged or brought to trial.
9
20111 (b) In Source A Lincoln appears almost to be at his wit’s end with McClellan, dropping unsubtle hints
1 about what he believes his general should be doing, such as matching the movements of the enemy and
2 not claiming that his horses are too tired. His use of the term ‘over-cautiousness’ is a clear criticism of an
3 experienced officer, and his sceptical tone in the second paragraph suggests that he does not believe
4 McClellan. Source D could not be more different than Source A in terms of Lincoln’s manner. Rather than
5 Lincoln appearing to be a meddler, he gives the impression of having absolute confidence in Grant,
6 expressing his ‘entire satisfaction’ and not even wishing to know ‘the particulars’ of Grant’s plans. He even
7 adds that he does not wish to restrain his general in any way. Sources A and D certainly do suggest that
8 Lincoln dealt with different officers in different ways.
9
30
(c) Lincoln was commander-in-chief during wartime, which by definition gave him greater powers than
1
2 during peacetime. The extracts in Source A do not necessarily show that he expanded his powers, but do
3 demonstrate his willingness to intervene in military affairs when, for example, he felt that McClellan’s ‘over-
4 cautiousness’ was an issue. He later dismissed McClellan when he was utterly convinced of his general’s
5 apparent reluctance to take the war to the South. In the same way Source D does not really give any indi-
6 cation that Lincoln had expanded his powers greatly other than confirming that although the war was
7 fought on the ground by soldiers, he was still ultimately in charge, even when giving his backing to an
8 officer. His expression that he did not ‘seek to know’ particulars of plans implies that he could have done
9 if he had wished to.
40 There is no doubt that Lincoln took a broad view of his Presidential powers and took the view that
1 saving the Union, even if it meant acting unconstitutionally at times, was worth it. He actually began to use
2 his war powers in April 1861 before Congress had officially recognised a war existed. His belief that the
3 ordinary legal process was not up to dealing with the wartime situation justified his use of martial law in
4 the border states and his decision to suspend ‘the writ of habeas corpus’ (Source B). Thirteen thousand
45 people were arrested under martial law during the war. He was later judged by the Supreme Court to have
46 exceeded his powers, but it is clear he would never have taken such actions during peacetime. The
47 Emancipation Proclamation and his rulings on Reconstruction were definitely dubious from a legal point
48 of view, but victory in war vindicated him. Source C’s threat that ‘a rebel soldier shall be executed’ for every
49222 Union soldier executed again demonstrates Lincoln using his ‘war powers’, as well as his ruthlessness.
There is no doubt that Lincoln expanded the powers of the Presidency during wartime, but he did not
do it any permanent way, and when peace came, the powers of the President reverted back to normal as
Congress gradually gained the ascendancy.
(a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain why in October 1862
Lincoln accused McClellan of being overcautious. (20)
(b) Study Sources B and C. How far do Sources B and C support the viewpoint that Lincoln
was prepared to act ruthlessly when necessary? (40)
(c) Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain the extent to which Lincoln was a
better wartime leader than Jefferson Davis. (60)
1 Songs of ‘the Blue and the Gray’
The following are extracts from popular Civil War songs. Students should examine the lyrics and discuss
the sentiments behind them as a way of gaining an insight into the motivations of the men who fought.
‘All Quiet along the Potomac’ ‘Maryland! My Maryland!

(sung by both armies) (a marching song of the Confederacy)
‘All quiet along the Potomac,’ they say, The despot’s heel is on thy shore,
Except now and then a stray picket Maryland!
Is shot, as he walks on his beat to and fro, His torch is at thy temple door,
By a rifleman hid in the thicket. Maryland!
’Tis nothing – a private or two now and Avenge the patriotic gore
then That flecked the streets of Baltimore,
Will not count in the news of the battle; And be the battle queen of yore,
Not an officer lost – only one of the men, Maryland! Maryland!
Moaning out, all alone, the death-rattle . . . James R. Randall
Ethel Lynn Beers
‘The Battle Hymn of the Republic’ ‘Tenting Tonight’

(Northern song) (popular with both sides)
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming We are tired of war on the old camp ground,
of the Lord: Many are dead and gone, of the brave and
He is tramping out the vintage where the true
grapes of wrath are stored; Who’ve left their homes, others been
He hath loosed the faithful lightning of his wounded long.
terrible swift sword: Many are the hearts that are weary tonight,
His truth is marching on. Wishing for the war to cease;
Julia Ward Howe Many are the hearts looking for the right
To see the dawn of peace . . .
Walter Kittredge
1111 ‘Weeping, Sad and Lonely’ ‘Lorena’

2111 (initially a Northern song but also adapted by the (popular with both sides)
3 South)
The years creep slowly by, Lorena,
4111
But our country called you, darling, The snow is on the grass again:
5
Angels cheer your way: The sun’s low down the sky, Lorena,
6
While our nation’s sons are fighting, The frost gleams where the flowers have
7
We can only pray. been,
8
Nobly strike for God and liberty, But the heart throbs on as warmly now,
9
Let all nations see As when the summer days were nigh;
10111
How we love the starry banner Oh, the sun can never dip so low,
1
Emblem of the free. Adown affection’s cloudless sky.
2
Charles C. Sawyer The sun can never dip so low,
3
Adown affection’s cloudless sky.
4
H.D.L. Webster (?)
5
6
7
8
9 2 Statistics on their side
20111
1 One of the key factors that helped to determine the outcome of the war was the advantage held by the
2222 North in population and resources. Use the following statistics to plot bar charts which show the advan-
3 tages the North held in percentage terms over the South in the areas listed below.
4
5 For example, population and railroad mileage.
6
7
8
North South
9
(%) (%)
30
1 Population 71 29
2
Railroad mileage 71 29
3
4 Farm acreage 65 35
5 Wheat production 80 20
6
7 Manufacturing output 92 8
8 Boots and shoes output 90 10
9
Firearm output 97 3
40
1 Cloth output 93 7
2
Cotton production 4 96
3
4 Coal production 97 3
45 Pig iron 94 6
46
47 Wealth produced 75 25
48 US army officers 67 33
49222
Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, McGraw-Hill Philip Jenkins, A History of the United States, Palgrave
(2000). (1997).
Ken Burns, The Civil War (video), DD Video (1989). Michael Johnson (ed.), Abraham Lincoln, Slavery, and the
Brian Collins, ‘Why did the South Lose?’, History Today, Civil War – Selected Writings and Speeches, Bedford
November (1988). (2001).
Henry Steel Commager, The Blue and the Gray, The Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University
Fairfax Press (1982). Press (1983/1995).
Alan Farmer, The American Civil War, 1861–1865, Hodder James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, Penguin (1990).
& Stoughton (1996). James McPherson, For Cause and Comrades, Oxford
Alan Farmer and Vivienne Sanders, American History, University Press (1997).
1810–1990, Hodder & Stoughton (2002). John M. Murrin, Paul E. Johnson, James M. McPherson
Donald Gilmore, ‘Revenge in Kansas, 1863’, History et al., Liberty Equality Power, Harcourt (2001).
Today, March (1993). Hugh Tulloch, The Debate on the American Civil War Era,
Susan-Mary Grant, ‘Pride and Prejudice in the Civil War’, Manchester University Press (1999).
History Today, September (1998). Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
Brian Holden Reid, ‘Why the Confederacy Lost’, History Longman (1996).
Today, November (1988).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 5
5
6
7
8
9 Politics, Reform and Westwards
10111
1
2
Expansion, 1865–1919
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111
1
2 This chapter will examine the post-war debate over individual rights, and the extent of state
3 and federal power through the issues of Reconstruction, westwards expansion, industrial-
4 isation, urbanisation, immigration, the rise of labour, Populism, ‘Gilded Age’ politics and
5
6
progressivism. (Note: the position of African Americans and the progress they made during
7 the period is essentially covered in Chapter 10.)
8
9
30 Historical background Labour and Populism
1 Progressivism
2 Reconstruction
3 Westwards expansion
4 The ‘Gilded Age’ and Populism Sources
5 Big business
6 The Progressive era and government 1 Big business and Progressivism
7 intervention 2 Immigration
8 Roosevelt, Taft and Wilson
9 Immigration
40 Organised labour Historical skills
1
2 1 Robber barons or captains of industry?
3 Essays 2 The themes of Progressive legislation
4
45 Reconstruction
46 Big business
47 The West
48 Immigration and government intervention
49222
94 • POLITICS, REFORM AND WESTWARDS EXPANSION, 1865–1919
Chronology
1865 Lincoln assassinated – Andrew Johnson became President

Freedmen’s Bureau established
1866 Civil Rights Bill passed by Congress and Freedmen’s Bureau expanded over
Johnson’s veto
National Labor Union founded by William Sylvis
1867 Congressional (Radical) Reconstruction began
1868 Impeachment of Andrew Johnson
Ulysses Grant (Republican) elected President
1869 Transcontinental railroad completed
Knights of Labor founded by Uriah Stephens
1870 Standard Oil founded by Rockefeller
1871 Ku Klux Klan Act passed
1872 Grant re-elected President
Boss Tweed convicted
1873 Carnegie Steel founded
Panic and depression
1877 Rutherford Hayes (Republican) became President following disputed election
End of Reconstruction
Desert Land Act
National railroad strike
1880 James Garfield (Republican) elected President
1881 Federation of Trades and Labor Unions (FTLU) founded
Garfield assassinated – Chester Arthur became President
1882 Chinese Exclusion Act
1883 Supreme Court upheld segregation
Pendleton Act began reform of civil service
1884 Grover Cleveland (Democrat) elected President
1886 Haymarket bombing, Chicago
American Federation of Labor founded out of the FTLU by Samuel Gompers and
Adolph Strasser
1887 Interstate Commerce Act
1888 Benjamin Harrison (Republican) elected President
1890 Sherman Anti-Trust Act
Sherman Silver Purchase Act
McKinley Tariff
Jacob Riis’s How the Other Half Lives published
1892 Homestead Steel Strike
Cleveland (Democrat) elected President
1893 Depression began
Sherman Silver Purchase Act repealed
1894 Immigration Restriction League founded
Pullman Strike
1896 William McKinley (Republican) elected President
1900 Galveston, Texas, created City Commission government
Robert La Follette (Progressive) elected governor of Wisconsin
1111
2111
3
4111 1901 McKinley assassinated – Theodore Roosevelt became President
5 1902 Ida Tarbell’s exposé of Standard Oil
6 Northern Securities Anti-Trust case
7 Newlands Act
8 1903 Elkins Act
9 Federal court dissolved Northern Securities Company
10111 1904 Theodore Roosevelt (Republican) elected President
1 1905 Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) founded
2 National Forest Service established
3 1906 Hepburn Railroad Regulation Act
4 Pure Food and Drug Act
5 Meat Inspection Act
6 1908 William Taft (Republican) elected President
7 1909 Payne-Aldrich Tariff
8 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire
9 1912 Wilson (Democrat) elected President
20111 1913 16th Amendment income tax
1 17th Amendment direct election of US senators
2 Federal Reserve Act
3 1914 Ludlow Massacre
4 Clayton Anti-Trust Act
5
6
7
8 Part 1: Historical background
9
30
1 Reconstruction
2
3 Over 600,000 American men had died during the Civil War, a quarter of all (white) Southern men of mili-
4 tary age had been killed or wounded, and, in 1865, the state of Mississippi had to spend 20 per cent of its
5 revenue on the purchase of artificial limbs for Confederate veterans. War had ruined the Southern economy,
6 and seen the national debt rise to $3 million. Approximately four million slaves had been freed, but many
7 would die from disease and starvation in the months following freedom. In addition to all of these issues
8 there remained the question of how and when the rebel states would be readmitted to the Union.
9 Lincoln’s main aim under what has become known as ‘Reconstruction’ was to readmit the Confederate
40 states to the Union as quickly as possible. As early as 1863 he issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and
1 Reconstruction, which proposed to grant readmission to the states and amnesty to all Southerners except
2 high civil and military leaders as long as 10 per cent of each state’s voters swore an oath of allegiance to
3 the US and recognised the ending of slavery. Lincoln also insisted that any legal confiscation of property
4 in the South would be limited to the lifetimes of its owners and would not apply to their heirs. Many
45 former slaveholders simply took the oath of allegiance and continued to own their land. In 1864 Louisiana
46 drew up a new constitution prohibiting slavery, but did not grant blacks, who made up nearly half the
47 population, the vote. When over 10 per cent of voters (based on number of votes cast in 1860) in Louisiana
48 supported the new Constitution, Lincoln was happy to see it return the Union. Republican Radicals,
49222 however, who viewed Reconstruction as a Congressional function, persuaded Congress to reject Louisiana’s
readmission and refuse to admit its senators, seeking to delay Reconstruction until after the war when the
President would be in a weaker position. Two of the Radicals, Benjamin Wade and Henry Davis, were
behind the Wade-Davis Bill, which proposed to exclude anyone who had taken up arms or held high office
for the Confederacy from either voting or standing for political office, and also required that 50 per cent
of a state’s voters take an ‘Ironclad Oath’, swearing that they had never supported secession voluntarily,
before readmission. Lincoln vetoed the Bill in August 1864, but the stage was set for future conflict.
With the death of Lincoln, which for many Northerners suggested a conspiracy organised by the leaders
of the South, Andrew Johnson became President. He had been the only Southern state senator to remain
loyal to the Union, and many radicals were optimistic that he would be less tolerant than Lincoln towards
the former rebel states. Their optimism was misplaced, and he continued in much the same vein as his
predecessor, although Lincoln had favoured a limited suffrage for blacks, and had not intended to pardon
as many ex-Confederates as Johnson set about doing. Johnson extended a general pardon to Confederates
who would take the oath of allegiance, and dealt generously with personal requests for pardons from
high office-holders (he pardoned about 15,000 ex-rebels, sometimes hundreds in a single day, and aban-
doned his intention to charge Southern officers and politicians with treason). In addition he recognised
governments in Virginia, Louisiana, Arkansas and Tennessee, and indicated that the other seven states
would be recognised if they withdrew their ordinances of secession, and ratified the 13th Amendment. The
Southern states, in flagrant defiance of their position, refused to enfranchise blacks, and in both state and
Congressional elections proceeded to vote for prominent ex-Confederates. Georgia chose Alexander
Stephens, the former Vice-President of the Confederacy, as its senator. To compound the situation the
Southern states introduced the so-called ‘Black Codes’ aimed at keeping blacks in a subordinate position
by restricting their legal, political, social and economic rights. Eric Foner (1984) found that violence
against blacks ‘reached staggering proportions’ in some areas, for example estimating that in the Shreveport
area of Louisiana over 2,000 blacks were killed in 1865. In December 1865 when Congress reassembled it
refused to allow those who had been voted in by the Southern states to take their seats (with the backing
of Northern opinion, which had turned against the South) and it set up a Joint Committee on
Reconstruction to determine whether the Southern states were ready to rejoin the Union.
Many of the leading Radicals who had blocked the seating of Southern representatives, such as Charles
Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens, had done so out of a genuine concern for black rights. Others such as
Wade had done it more for reasons of political advantage realising that, following emancipation, blacks
would count for five-fifths rather than three-fifths when calculating populations and hence the Southern
states would be entitled to 15 extra seats in the House of Representatives. With the war over, there was a
good chance that Northern and Southern Democrats would reunite, possibly leaving the Republicans as
the smaller party (in 1864 the Democrats had won 45 per cent of the Northern vote). It was therefore
imperative to disenfranchise as many ex-Confederates as possible and ensure that as many blacks as possible
got the vote (it was assumed that blacks would vote Republican). There were certainly vested business inter-
ests who wished to see the continued Republican dominance of Congress, but Maldwyn Jones (1995) has
argued that, despite Congress passing measures during the war of which Southerners disapproved, Northern
businessmen were divided over tariff and currency policies, as were the Republicans. There was, therefore,
a range of aims for Congressional Reconstruction which included:
• the readmission of the Southern states;

• the improvement of black rights (which some hoped would prevent an exodus of freed slaves to the
North where they would come into direct competition with poor white workers);
• the maintenance of the Northern/Republican dominance of government;
• the economic rehabilitation of the South;
• and possibly an element of vindictiveness following the South’s apparent reluctance to accept the verdict
of war and the terms of their defeat. (Northerners never did ‘hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree’ as
1111 the words to the song ‘John Brown’s Body’ promised, although he was imprisoned for two years.
2111 In fact only one man was executed for his role in the war, Henry Wirz, who had been in charge of the
3 notorious Andersonville prison camp.)
4111
5 For the next three years Johnson was at loggerheads with Congress over the course Reconstruction
6 should take, vetoing an extension to the lifetime of and expansion of the legal power of the Freedmen’s
7 Bureau (which had initially been set up in March 1865 to provide ex-slaves (and whites) with food, shelter,
8 clothing, food, medical aid and education, and to find land on which some of them might settle) and
9 also vetoing a Civil Rights Bill which promised full citizenship for blacks. Johnson argued that the former
10111 would unconstitutionally extend military rule during peacetime and the latter would infringe states’
1 rights and should not be passed while 11 states were still not represented in Congress. His stance pushed
2 many moderates into the hands of the Radicals, who were able to gain the two-thirds majority needed
3 to repass the laws over Johnson’s veto. It also enabled Congress to pass the 14th Amendment in 1868
4 giving blacks citizenship and penalising any state which refused to allow them to vote. Only Tennessee
5 ratified, and was declared to be back in the Union. The other ten rejected it and were left outside the Union,
6 although Delaware and Kentucky, slave states that had remained loyal to the Union during the war, also
7 rejected it.
8 From 1867 (with the First (Military) Reconstruction Act, passed over Johnson’s veto) to 1877 most of
9 the South was controlled by Republican administrations and the military, while many Southern whites were
20111 disqualified from voting and office-holding, and many pardons granted by Johnson were withdrawn.
1
Southern states refused to call conventions to draft new constitutions which would allow for black suffrage
2
and the disqualification of ex-Confederates. Johnson tried to undermine ‘Radical Reconstruction’ by
3
replacing military governors appointed by Congress with men more sympathetic to the South. He believed
4
that Congress was going too far and feared that the federal system itself was under threat from centralising
5
tendencies. Matters came to a head between Johnson and his Congress following the passage of two Acts
6
in March 1867. The Tenure of Office Act forbade the President to remove civil office-holders without the
7
approval of the Senate – a move designed to protect Stanton, Johnson’s Secretary of War who was a staunch
8
ally of the Radicals – and the Command of the Army Act prevented the President from issuing military
9
orders except through the commanding general of the army, or from relieving the commanding general or
30
1 assigning him elsewhere without the Senate’s consent. Congress had already been at odds with the Supreme
2 Court over the use of martial law in peacetime where civil courts were available, and it was highly likely
3 that the Supreme Court would rule that the two new laws restricting the power of the President were uncon-
4 stitutional. In this hope Johnson dismissed Stanton, but before the case could come to court, the House
5 of Representatives voted to impeach Johnson for ‘high crimes and misdemeanours in office’, seemingly
6 believing that this was the only way of getting their brand of Reconstruction through. In the end, 7
7 Republican senators (who effectively sacrificed their careers by doing so) voted with 12 Democrats for
8 acquittal, fearing that Johnson’s removal would permanently damage the Presidency, and that Benjamin
9 Wade would probably succeed him. Johnson was never the same after the trial, and Congressional-style
40 Reconstruction won the day. By June 1868, six of the former rebel states had been readmitted to the Union.
1 Mississippi, Texas, Georgia and Virginia were not readmitted until 1870.
2 Ulysses Grant became President in the 1868 election but needed 700,000 black votes to win a popular
3 majority of 300,000. Grant was unsuited to the Presidency and a poor judge of character when it came to
4 choosing his political allies. His administration became tainted by scandal and corruption in high places,
45 in a sense reflecting the corruption apparently endemic across the whole country, for example, in New York
46 under ‘Boss’ William Tweed, who controlled the city’s Democratic machine at Tammany Hall. Under Grant,
47 Reconstruction continued to take its course. In the South, Southern collaborators (‘scalawags’) and Yankee
48 financiers (‘carpet-baggers’) ran the show, but despite their denigrators and the countless accusations of
49222 waste, corruption and overspending, many were men of integrity who set up businesses, poor relief, fairer
tax systems, expanded railroad building and founded schools. Nonetheless, this did not wash with the
‘die-hards’ who blamed the 50 per cent fall in the price of cotton between 1872 and 1877 and Southern
poverty in general on the Radical regimes, and formed groups such as the ‘Knights of the White
Chamelia’, ‘the Red Shirts’, ‘the White League’ and the ‘Ku Klux Klan’ to intimidate blacks and white
collaborators. Ultimately, the Republican regimes in the South during Reconstruction relied on the
manipulation of the black vote, and the political will of Washington to back them, by use of military
force if necessary. Grant took action in 1870–1 with three Force Acts, and by the end of 1871 the Klan had
effectively been suppressed.
Gradually wartime hatreds faded and people took the view that Southern whites and blacks would
eventually have to sort out their own problems. Some of the Radical Republicans died and the political will
to enforce Reconstruction at the barrel of a gun waned, as other issues such as the scandal in Washington
and the ‘panic of 1873’ came to the fore. In 1872 the Amnesty Act restored political rights to all but a few
ex-Confederates, and the Freedmen’s Bureau was allowed to lapse. White Southerners sensed the changing
mood in the North and seized the initiative. In 1874 Democrats devised the Mississippi Plan to push the
remaining scalawags into the Democrat party and prevent blacks from voting. White rifle clubs and semi-
military groups marched openly, and politically active blacks were refused jobs, charged higher prices in
shops and denied tenancies. Eric Foner (1984) sees Grant’s failure to intervene in Mississippi as a mile-
stone in the retreat from Reconstruction. Tennessee and Virginia were effectively back under Democrat
control as early as 1869, and by 1876 whites had redeemed every state in the South except Louisiana, South
Carolina and Florida, all three of which would play a key role in the controversial election of 1876.
The Presidential election of 1876 was marked by fraud on both sides, and the results were disputed in
three states. A Congressional commission decided in a strictly partisan way to effectively award the elec-
tion to Rutherford Hayes, the Republican governor of Ohio, rather than Samuel Tilden, the Democrat
governor of New York. To avoid further trouble, Hayes (from then on known by opponents as ‘His
Accidency’ or ‘His Fraudulency’) promised Tilden he would appoint a leading Southerner to his cabinet,
deal sympathetically with Southern demands for railroad subsidies and remove the last federal troops
from the South. With the removal of the military came the collapse of the last three Republican state
governments in the South and Reconstruction was over.
To assess whether Reconstruction can be seen as a success, it is necessary to determine whether its
aims were met and to view it from the different perspectives of those involved. Reconstruction was successful
in that the Union was restored in a relatively peaceful manner, although some have argued that it left a
more bitter legacy in sectional and racial terms than the war itself. Jones has said that by 1877 ‘reunion
had been achieved, but not reconciliation’ (1995: p. 259). Slavery was abolished, clearly a landmark in the
progress of black Americans, but, Jones argues, a modus vivendi was reached by white Americans at the
expense of blacks, with the North effectively abandoning the race problem to the South. During
Reconstruction 2 blacks won seats in the Senate and 15 in the Representatives. Well over 600 sat on state
legislatures – ‘a stunning departure’ in American politics according to Foner – but after 1877 numbers
dwindled. By 1900 George White was the only black congressman left, while black rights were steadily
eroded and segregation became the norm in the South. Ransom and Foner have stressed the major role
blacks played during the process and how the foundations of a modern black community were laid
with black churches and businesses being set up and blacks themselves becoming landowners, teachers
and clergymen. They have also suggested that blacks made more progress economically than previously
thought, and improved their living standards substantially in some cases. Education and health improved
for all those living in the South to a certain extent. Brinkley (2000) has argued that the dramatic im-
provement in Southern education was perhaps the most important accomplishment of Reconstruction.
The Freedmen’s Bureau coordinated the spending of $17 million on setting up 100 hospitals and 4,000
schools, as well as establishing the first black institutions of higher education. By 1876 there were 70,000
blacks at school in the South compared to none in 1860, and there were 50,000 whites at school compared
to 20,000 in 1860.
1111 Dunning, writing in the early twentieth century, claimed the South had been cruelly oppressed during
2111 Reconstruction. This view is now regarded as grossly overstated, although such was the level of intimida-
3 tion brought against the Supreme Court by Radical Republicans that in 1867 it refused to take two cases
4111 where Southern states were seeking injunctions against the enforcement of the Reconstruction Acts. In the
5 1950s and 1960s Stampp and John Hope Franklin depicted Reconstruction as lenient, with few Confederates
6 imprisoned, only one executed, and with most recovering both their land and the vote. Farmer (1997) also
7 sees Reconstruction as a success for Southern whites even though the South was to remain an impover-
8 ished region of the country, dependent almost entirely on cotton, with many Southerners, white and black
9 alike, reduced to tenant farming. After 1877, the South came under the control of a powerful conservative
10111 elite, the ‘Redeemers’ or ‘Bourbons’, many of them from the planter class that had dominated the pre-war
1 South, and, in the words of Foner, ‘the dark night of injustice settled over the South’ (1984: p. 612).
2
3
4 Westwards expansion
5
6 The growth of the US had continued pretty much unabated since Jefferson’s purchase of the Louisiana
7 Territory in 1802. The West came to represent an important element in the American psyche, taking on
8 mythical proportions, and seemingly symbolising some sort of American ethos. Walt Whitman called it
9 ‘the real genuine America’, a place where democracy and equality thrived against a backdrop of harsh
20111 weather conditions and the threat from hostile Indians. Erasmus Beadle’s Western dime novels, which were
1 churned out from 1860 onwards, glorified the image of the West as did the paintings of Russell and
2 Remington, emphasising rugged individualism and self-reliance, virtues which many wanted to be a reflec-
3 tion of American society as a whole. In the 1890s Frederick Jackson Turner, then a young historian, argued
4 that the advancement of American settlement westwards explained American development, and that democ-
5 racy was born on the frontier, confirming for many a belief that in some way the frontier had contributed
6 to the values of liberty and equality held so dear by many Americans. Although no historian since has
7 successfully argued that the frontier had no impact on American development, Turner’s views have pretty
8 much been discredited by those who have pointed to the importance of the east, the influence of European
9 thinking on democracy, the roles of government and business in settling the West, the parts played by
30 women, blacks, Native Americans, Chinese and Hispanics, and so on.
1 Between 1862 and 1900 the government gave out 80 million acres under the Homestead Act, but much
2 of the land went to speculators, cattlemen, mining and lumber companies. The government failed to appre-
3 ciate that many ordinary people could not afford to buy 160 acres, or that 160 acres was too small to make
4 a living on the Great Plains, as well as the investment farmers had to make in tools, seeds and livestock.
5 Further land grants (the 1873 Timber Culture Act, which allowed individuals to claim an extra 160 acres
6 if they planted it with trees within ten years, and the 1877 Desert Land Act, which allowed settlers to buy
7 an additional 640 acres provided the area was irrigated within two years) served to obstruct genuine settle-
8 ment further. Colonising activities contributed far more to settlement than public land policy, with railroads
9 advertising the benefits of life on the Plains and even offering temporary shelter and lessons in farming to
40 those willing to go west. During the war alone the federal government gave over 100 million acres to the
1 railroads, and between 1869 and 1893 five transcontinental railroads were built. Large numbers of Britons,
2 Germans and Scandinavians moved from the eastern states but their departure tended to be more than
3 offset by the numbers of immigrants coming into the US after the war, who invariably settled in the growing
4 cities of the east. Inventions such as barbed wire, wells, windmills, better ploughs and reapers helped settlers
45 overcome the adversities they faced, along with a government policy directed against the Indians.
46 Although the pioneers and settlers travelled from east to west, the mining frontier advanced from
47 west to east, following the discovery of gold in California in 1848. The image of ’49-er prospectors staking
48 their claims and panning for gold was slowly replaced by that of the machinery of big business, as it came
49222 to appreciate the potential that certain minerals had. By the 1870s silver had taken over from gold as the
main mineral mined, while copper mines provided the copper wire for light bulbs and telephones. In 1867,
35,000 cattle were shipped from the railhead of Abilene, Kansas; by 1871, 700,000 were passing through
that same route, and other railheads had been established by the cattlemen and cowboys at Dodge City,
Wichita and Laramie, while the development of the refrigerator car had also made a significant contribu-
tion. Cattle fattened on the Great Plains led to the end of the open range, as did the development of ranching
and the railroads, and even the fencing-in of land by ranchers came to resemble the large-scale corporatism
of American industry, and contributed to the destruction of the Plains Indians.
When gold was discovered in 1875 in the Black Hills of Dakota, one of the areas the government had
recognised as an Indian reservation several years earlier, the government broke its promise. In 1876 General
George Armstrong Custer was sent in to assess the strength of the Indians who had gathered in Montana
under Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. Custer split his force and attacked instead, and his command was
wiped out at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. News reached Washington during the centennial celebra-
tions. After that it could only be a matter of time before the Indians were brought to heel. In 1886
Geronimo’s Apaches were defeated and then in 1890, at Wounded Knee Creek, 200 Indians, mostly women
and children, were gunned down by the Seventh Cavalry, putting an end to any resistance. The railroads,
electric telegraph, Winchester repeating rifle, destruction of millions of buffalo, white attitudes, disease,
and government policy combined against the Native Americans, who were placed on reservations and
taught white ways. In the 1870s and 1880s the Indian Rights Association and National Indian Defense
Association persuaded the federal government to adopt a policy of breaking down tribal structures and
assimilating the Indians. In 1887 the Dawes Act stated that Indians could become citizens if they renounced
tribal ways, and it also broke up reservation land into smaller plots, which allowed land-grabbing by whites.
The ‘Gilded Age’ and Populism
The ‘Gilded Age’ is a term often applied in a negative way to the quarter century after the Civil War, and
was taken from a novel by Mark Twain and Charles Warner(1873) that criticised the superficiality of
economic growth and materialism. The period is often viewed as being very much in contrast to the 1890s,
which saw the beginning of the so-called Progressive movement (when action started to be taken to address
some of the problems America faced). During the 1870s and 1880s despite the romantic symbolism of the
western frontier, the dominant themes within the US were urban growth and industrial expansion on a
massive scale, both of which were largely fuelled by the millions of immigrants who entered the country
during that period. The gap between rich and poor widened, social problems multiplied, the pressure on
governments to intervene more directly in people’s lives grew to an unprecedented level, and big business
came to dominate politics, which was based on patronage rather than principle and was all about power,
as well as the economy.
Johnson’s impeachment was soon followed by Grant’s Presidency, which was dogged by corruption.
The most infamous scandal involved the Credit Mobilier company and the construction of the Union
Pacific Railroad with the submission of false bills and the attempted bribery of congressmen in the hope
of preventing an investigation taking place. Graft was also widespread in city politics with party bosses and
party machines ruling the corrupt roost. Boss Tweed in New York defrauded taxpayers out of an estimated
$50 million before being jailed for fraud in 1873, largely as a result of a prolonged campaign against him
by celebrated cartoonist Thomas Nast.
In the five Presidential elections between 1876 and 1892 no more than 1 per cent of the popular vote
separated the two leading candidates, except in 1892 when it was 3 per cent. Both parties tried to avoid
taking a stand on the controversial issues of the day, with patronage becoming more important than prin-
ciple to many in politics, but electoral turnout was higher than at any time in American history. During
the period the government came to take greater responsibility for issues such as finance, immigration,
women’s rights and Populism. The assassination of President James Garfield in 1881 gave a final push for
1111 the reform of the civil service and in 1883 the Pendleton Act opened up some civil service jobs to compet-
2111 itive exams. In 1884 Grover Cleveland became the first Democrat President to be elected in 28 years. With
3 a large surplus in the Treasury Cleveland vetoed a bill that would have granted $100,000 to help Texas
4111 farmers buy seed grain during a drought, arguing that such a move might weaken the national character,
5 yet in the same year paid government bondholders at $28 above the $100 value of each bond, at a cost of
6 $45 million.
7 The Presidential election of 1888 was the most corrupt in American history, with the Republicans
8 outbidding their opponents to win majorities in both Houses of the so-called ‘Billion Dollar Congress’.
9 The government went on to pass the Dependent Pensions Bill and the McKinley Tariff Act (which was
10111 regarded as a payback to the financial backers of the party). By the Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890,
1 the government agreed to buy up a certain amount of silver every month (which pleased miners) and to
2 issue paper money (which had an inflationary effect and pleased western farmers). In addition public
3 works were set up and subsidies were given to steamships. The most significant developments in the 1890
4 mid-terms were the loss by the Republicans of nearly half their seats in the House (the Tariff Act and the
5 extravagance of Congress were blamed but there were other factors as well) and the election of nine
6 new congressmen and two senators from the Alliance-Populists representing farmers. As early as 1867
7 the first national farmers’ organisation, the National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry (or Grangers),
8 was set up. It had social and educational aims and worked with the major political parties. During 1873–4
9 the Grangers won control of 11 mid-western state legislatures, but lost strength with the return of
20111 prosperity in the late 1870s. Other farmers’ groups joined the Greenback Labor Party, which won over
1 a million votes and 14 seats in the 1878 Congressional elections with its call for inflation. Farmers were
2 suffering from declining status and there was overproduction internationally; wheat farmers in particular
3 were affected, as were cotton planters whose markets were mainly abroad. By the end of the 1880s farmers’
4 organisations had formed the Southern Alliance (which called for loans in paper money from the
5 Treasury) and the Northwest Farmers Alliance (which organised statewide parties) and in 1890 they
6 had won a number of state legislatures, and had two senators and nine congressmen. The Southern Alliance
7 was worried about splitting the South with a new party so it set out to control the Democrats, returning
8 two state governors and 40 congressmen. The Northwest Alliance formed the People’s Party (or Populists)
9 in 1892, calling for low interest loans, a graduated progressive income tax, federal ownership of the
30 hated railroads, direct election of senators, the free unlimited coinage of silver (the government kept the
1 amount of money in circulation steady, but with the population growing this caused problems, particu-
2 larly for those owing money), a shorter working day, immigration restrictions and the use of more
3 democratic political tools, such as the secret ballot, initiative, referendum, recall and directive. They did
4 well in the middle border and Rocky Mountain states, winning four of them, but only polled 9 per cent
5 of the total vote, not doing particularly well in some of the old Granger states, where farmers had diversi-
6 fied, or in the South, where whites tended to stick with the Democrats.
7 Populism continued after the Panic of 1893 and subsequent unemployment. President Cleveland was
8 convinced that the Depression had been caused by the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, which had allowed
9 holders of silver certificates to exchange them for gold leading to a drain on Treasury gold reserves. In 1893
40 he secured its repeal with Republican support but this had little effect and it was a loan from the banks
1 which ended the monetary crisis at the end of 1896. The 1896 election was dominated by the battle of the
2 gold and silver standards. The Republicans, with William McKinley of Ohio, supported the ‘hard money’
3 gold standard and protective tariff while the Democrats put forward William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska
4 campaigning for free silver. During the campaign he uttered the immortal words: ‘You shall not crucify
45 mankind upon a cross of gold.’ Eastern bankers and industrialists funded the Republicans, while Bryan
46 absorbed the Populist votes, but lost despite winning 22 out of 45 states. Urban workers realised inflation
47 would cut their real wages and they would pay more for bread if wheat prices rose. Populism was the first
48 organised political movement to identify and try to deal with some of the problems of industrialisation. In
49222 1900 the country officially adopted the gold standard.
The ‘Gilded Age’ was not all bad, though, according to some. Robert Barrows identifies the ‘reformist’
historians as those who concentrate on the corruption of the political machines and heavily criticise city
government; the ‘functionalists’ who believe the bosses met the basic vital needs of their constituents such
as jobs, food and fuel; and the ‘celebrationists’ who regard municipal government during the period as a
great success in solving such problems as water supply, sewage disposal, public health and transportation,
and for providing parks and libraries. Nor was politics at a national level rotten through and through, for
there were many men of integrity serving in the Senate, and also the frequent appearance of third parties
such as the Granger movement.
The Republican Party remained the party of the Union. Its core support lay in New England and the
upper mid-west, with the business community, many working men and better-off farmers. The Democrats
remained strong among Southern whites, immigrants in the big Northern cities, Catholics, small farmers
and a minority of businessmen. Parties tried to cover up the differences between them, but the Republicans
continued to support an integrated economy, protective tariff and black progress (or at least paid it
lip-service), and were sympathetic to Prohibition, Sabbatarianism, and immigration restrictions. The
Democrats remained sympathetic to states’ rights and tariff reduction, but unsympathetic to blacks.
Big business
The United States’ vast supplies of natural resources, the railroads and mass production techniques, as well
as government support, foreign capital, cheap immigrant labour and a hard work ethos, all contributed to
the rapid growth of industrialisation after the war. With the expansion of industry came the emergence of
a new business elite and class of weekly wage earners, and trusts, which were essentially large-scale combina-
tions of nominally independent and apparently competing firms controlled by a board of trustees. They
cut manufacturing costs, and allowed better coordination and specialisation, but also limited competition,
resulting in near monopolies in certain areas and allowing trustees to accumulate vast amounts of wealth
and political influence. In 1882 Standard Oil of Ohio created the first trust – albeit one which was based
largely on intimidation and predatory pricing. Others followed, and fairly soon men such as Andrew
Carnegie (steel), William Vanderbilt (railroads), John D. Rockefeller (oil) and J.P. Morgan (banking) were
household names.
People soon ‘grasped that businessmen who wanted to control raw materials, markets, workers and
the legal system might also have greater power than ordinary citizens in local, state and federal govern-
ment’ (Milton Goldin, 1988). For example, by 1888 the Pennsylvania Railroad had gross receipts of $115
million and employed 100,000 men, while the entire state of Massachusetts had gross receipts of $7 million
and employed 6,000 men. By 1890 railroad revenue was well over double that of the federal government.
Thomas Edison promised New Jersey politicians $1,000 each in return for certain legislation which would
be beneficial to him. J.P. Morgan, at his peak, sat on the boards of 48 corporations, and Rockefeller on 37.
Eric Arnesen was happy to use the term ‘robber baron’ rather than ‘captain of industry’ when referring to
the new breed of capitalist, and emphasised the poor condition of labour rather than the rise in real wages
and reduction in hours; and Howard Zinn (1996) was equally scathing, highlighting the levels of bribery
and corruption in high places associated with the building of the first transcontinental railroad. He empha-
sised the unscrupulous nature of J.P. Morgan who, during the Civil War, had sold defective rifles that
tended to shoot off the thumbs of those using them, and had avoided military service himself by paying
$300 to a substitute – as had John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie and Jay Gould.
Porter has stressed the positive contribution of new goods and services for consumers and claimed
that big business never really threatened democracy or Republican values. By Andrew Carnegie’s death in
1919, he had given away $350,695,653. Nevertheless the anti-trust movement was largely motivated by fears
that the economic power accumulated by certain trusts threatened democracy and individualism. By the
end of the century the term ‘laissez-faire’, which had once been associated with individual freedom, had
1111 come to stand for trusts and the associated loss of individual freedom, with competition stifled and workers
2111 de-humanised by their conditions.
3
4111
5 The Progressive era and government intervention
6
7 As early as the 1870s writers and journalists began to criticise big business. Henry Demarest Lloyd exposed
8 the Standard Oil Company in 1881, in The Atlantic Monthly, and Jacob Riis in 1890 brought the slums of
9 New York to national prominence in his book How the Other Half Lives. The term ‘muckraking’ is often
10111 attributed to the November 1902 issue of McClure’s, in which Ida Tarbell exposed Standard Oil. The article
1 was followed by similar exposés in the magazine such as Lincoln Steffens’s attacks on urban corruption.
2 President Theodore Roosevelt disliked some of the sensationalist journalism associated with ‘muckraking’,
3 but there could be no doubting the collective will to tackle the problems of an urbanised and industrialised
4 society. Progressivism, which emerged in the 1890s, was never a unified movement. It encompassed such
5 issues as: the prohibition of alcohol, the vote for women, reform of local government, the improvement of
6 working conditions, child labour, regulation of the economy, public health and housing, and conservation.
7 More than anything else, it was perhaps a moral movement which spread nationwide embracing politi-
8 cians from all parties, mainly driven by middle-class urban dwellers who were generally well educated,
9 sympathetic towards a redistribution of wealth, and concerned about trusts, concentrations of wealth, social
20111 problems, crime (during the 1880s the murder rate quadrupled and the prison population rose by a half),
1 violent strikes, immigration and political corruption. Cynics such as George Mowry and Richard Hofstadter
2 in the 1950s saw the movement as a privileged middle-class elite attempting to regain status in the wake
3 of ground lost to big business leaders, rather than it being genuinely popular, and since then a whole range
4 of interpretations have emerged.
5 Gabriel Kolko has argued that Progressivism actually helped to stabilise the capitalist system during a
6 time of uncertainty. The Commission Plan first used in 1901 following a devastating flood in Galveston,
7 Texas, gave trained experts power rather than professional politicians. Robert M. La Follette of Wisconsin
8 was an outstanding Progressive state governor between 1900 and 1906, pioneering Progressive ideas, such
9 as extending workers’ rights, improving education, cleaning up politics, and widening the scope for public
30 participation with the use of such devices as the referendum. Roosevelt dubbed Wisconsin ‘the laboratory
1 of democracy’. Perhaps not surprisingly the Senate’s first socialist came from Wisconsin.
2 Progressivism gradually increased the pressure on federal government to intervene more directly in
3 national life, although in many areas state and city government had beaten Washington to it. In 1869
4 Massachusetts was the first state to establish a supervisory railroad commission, and in 1871 ‘Granger laws’
5 in Illinois set maximum rates for passengers and freight. However, unscrupulous businessmen could
6 get round state laws. For example, during the so-called Erie Railroad Wars, Cornelius Vanderbilt started
7 to buy shares in the Erie Railroad Company, his competitor, to drive it out of business. Daniel Drew, Jay
8 Gould and Jim Fisk, shareholders in Erie, had 100,000 worthless stocks printed, which they sold to
9 Vanderbilt. With their arrest imminent, Fisk, Gould and Drew travelled to New Jersey where New York
40 laws did not apply to what they had done. From safety Gould bribed members of the New York state legis-
1 lature to the tune of $1 million to pass a law making the sale of watered stock legal. As a result he, Drew
2 and Fisk got away with $7 million.
3 During the 1880s hostility towards the railroads extended to a more general attack on trusts (monop-
4 olies or colluding companies). There were laws passed prohibiting trusts in 27 states and territories, but
45 trusts often circumvented such laws by moving their headquarters to states where the laws were more lax.
46 In 1886 the Supreme Court also decided that state intervention encroached on the exclusive power of
47 Congress to regulate commerce. Neither did the states have the power to regulate trusts involved in inter-
48 state commerce, which of course made it very difficult to bring the railroads to book, but in 1887 Congress
49222 established an Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to regulate railroad abuses such as rebates and
discriminatory charging. The early rulings of the ICC were constantly challenged and generally overturned
by the Supreme Court. Nonetheless, it marked a step forward in government attempts to regulate big busi-
ness, although some may argue it did virtually nothing to regulate the railroads. In 1888 both Republicans
and Democrats promised action to curb the trusts, and in 1890 Congress passed the Sherman Anti-Trust
Act aimed at breaking the monopolistic practices of trusts, although the wording of the measure left it open
to wide interpretation by the courts and it even came to be used against unions deemed to be interfering
with free trade.
Roosevelt, Taft and Wilson
Theodore Roosevelt of New York was the first of three Progressive Presidents and, in taking over the office
at the age of 42 following McKinley’s assassination, he is still the youngest man to hold the office. He called
the office of President ‘a bully pulpit’, and believed it was his duty to do whatever was in the national
interest so long as there was nothing in the Constitution to stop him. He was cautious initially, as befit-
ting someone who had not actually been elected to the office, although only a year after becoming President
he intervened decisively in a miners’ strike by threatening the mine owners with federal takeover of their
mines unless they came to terms with the miners. In 1902 he used the moribund Sherman Anti-Trust Act
to dissolve a railroad holding company – much to the amazement of J.P. Morgan who could not believe
that Roosevelt had not been prepared to discuss the issue with him first. By the time Roosevelt had become
President, trusts essentially monopolised vital commodities such as oil, beef and the railroads. His govern-
ment developed a reputation for ‘trust-busting’, though often his rhetoric was more radical than his actions,
and he certainly took the view that regulation was preferable to dissolving companies, acknowledging the
importance of big business to the US. Hofstadter has called him a conservative from the start. Nevertheless
in 1903 he persuaded Congress to set up a Bureau of Corporations to investigate the abuses of trusts, and
his government used the Sherman Act against 44 corporations. In actual fact, more trusts were set up under
Roosevelt than had been under McKinley, and Taft was to mount twice as many anti-trust suits in four
years as Roosevelt had in seven.
Roosevelt’s offer of a ‘square deal’ in 1904 won him election in his own right. His second term was
less impressive in many ways, despite the passage of the Hepburn Act in 1906 (which allowed for stricter
regulation of the railroads and extended the powers of the ICC), as well as the 1906 Meat Inspection Act
(following the publication of Upton Sinclair’s novel The Jungle, which highlighted the appalling conditions
in the meat-packing industry) and the Pure Food and Drug Act, both of which were landmark measures
in public health. The Newlands Act of 1902 allowed Roosevelt to permit land reclamation and dam building
to help irrigate millions of acres of western land, and he used the 1891 Forest Reserve Act to protect 150
million acres of forest land. He also, perhaps dubiously, closed 85 million acres in Alaska and the north-
west, which were rich in coal and oil, to public entry. Some of his actions brought Roosevelt into conflict
with Congress, which tended to see conservation as a threat to private initiative. Before standing down in
the face of big business reluctance to embrace greater reform and the rise of socialism (which wanted to
vastly increase the role of the state), he had called for increased use of the eight-hour day, income tax,
death duties, limitations on injunctions in strikes, federal supervision of the stock market and workmen’s
compensation laws – all measures designed to help the workforce.
William H. Taft of Ohio, who defeated Bryan for the Presidency in 1908, was more conservative than
Roosevelt, but nonetheless GEC and US Steel were both prosecuted during his term in office. Other notable
achievements included the Mann-Elkins Act, which extended the jurisdiction of the ICC, the establishment
of a postal savings bank, the creation of a Department of Labor and Federal Children’s Bureau, the approval
of an eight-hour day for federal workers and safety legislation for miners, and support for the 16th
Amendment for income tax, and the 17th Amendment for the direct election of senators. Following Taft’s
siding with the Old Guard conservative Republicans (‘standpatters’) over the role of the speaker of
1111 the House and the Tariff, the Progressives (or ‘insurgents’ as they would be called) lost faith in him. Taft
2111 annoyed many by signing the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Bill and a trade agreement with Canada, and the re-
3 opening of water sites to public entry led to big Republican losses in the mid-terms of 1910, with the
4111 Democrats taking control of the House.
5 It seemed that Roosevelt had returned from his world tour in the nick of time, and in 1912 he stood
6 as Presidential candidate for the Progressive Bull Moose party on a New Nationalism platform. The
7 Democrats, under Woodrow Wilson of New Jersey, called for a ‘New Freedom’ and endorsed a similarly
8 progressive set of policies. Taft was the official Republican candidate.
9 Following his election victory, which resulted from the splitting of the Republican vote, Wilson took
10111 a lead in legislative matters and used patronage to ensure the passage of such laws as the Underwood-
1 Simmons Tariff Act in 1913, which cut duties. He created a more flexible currency and 12 Federal Reserve
2 Banks, while the Federal Trade Commission Act established a commission to regulate and investigate busi-
3 ness practices, and the Clayton Act of 1914 legislated against price discrimination which led to monopoly.
4 Following Republican gains in 1914, Wilson went on to support long-term rural credit through Federal
5 Land Banks, compensation for federal workers, child labour laws and eight-hour days for railway workers,
6 effectively adopting Roosevelt’s ‘New Nationalism’. In 1919 the 19th Amendment, giving women the vote
7 nationally, was passed – although women already had the vote in several states.
8 In many respects, however, with the coming of the First World War, Wilson’s term in office saw a
9 repression of freedoms. As well as the renaming of German-American terms during the war – e.g. sauer-
20111 kraut became ‘liberty cabbage’ and hamburger ‘liberty sandwich’ – the Espionage, Sabotage and Sedition
1 Acts passed in 1917–18 gave the government sweeping powers to curb dissent and marked the greatest
2 curtailment of freedom since 1798. By the spring of 1918 the government had arrested 2,000 members of
3 the left-wing Industrial Workers of the World which had opposed the war. Eugene Debs, President of the
4 American Railway Union and Socialist Presidential candidate, was sentenced to ten years in prison for an
5 anti-war speech. In the meantime the Committee on Public Information set up by Wilson encouraged
6 people to report neighbours they suspected of being anti-war, spread tales of German atrocities and
7 contributed to the wave of anti-German hysteria. Some German-Americans felt obliged to change their
8 names in order to avoid hostility. Wilson also reluctantly signed a bill introducing a literacy test for
9 immigrants in 1917 (see ‘Immigration’, Chapter 6).
30 None of the so-called ‘Progressive Presidents’ had solved the problems of monopoly, reduced inequality
1 or removed ‘boss rule’ or political corruption. Social welfare still lagged well behind Europe and big business
2 would make a comeback in the 1920s.
3
4
5 Immigration
6
7 The sheer scale of immigration to the US during the nineteenth century was bound to cause problems.
8 Waves of immigration tended to follow certain patterns. Before the Civil War the so-called ‘old immigra-
9 tion’ consisted of British, German and Irish immigrants, plus some Dutch, Swiss and Scandinavian
40 immigrants, who tended to settle along the eastern seaboard and upper Mississippi valley. In the 1830s
1 about 50,000 immigrants a year arrived, but by the 1850s those numbers had risen to 300,000. By 1860
2 New York had 200,000 Irish, who became the country’s first slum dwellers and the target of the anti-
3 Catholic nativism of the ‘Know-Nothing’ or American Party, which feared the loss of social unity, crime
4 and poverty that foreigners seemed to bring with them. In 1858, for example, out of 17,000 arrests in a
45 New York quarter, 14,500 were foreigners and of these 10,500 were Irish.
46 Immigrant communities were also linked to electoral violence and fraud. Catholicism was linked to
47 the absolutist monarchies of Europe, and was felt to be incompatible with American values. Rumours of
48 papal plots abounded. Millard Fillmore stood for the ‘Know-Nothings’ in the Presidential election of 1856
49222 on a platform that aimed to keep Catholics out, limit their political influence and exclude ‘undesirables’
Figure 5.1 Pie-charts showing sources of from entering the country. Support came in par-
immigration, 1860–1920 ticular from native-born Protestant skilled
workers and small businessmen – and in 1854
Other
Northwestern
they won 104 Congressional seats out of 234.
Eastern European ‘Know-Nothingism’ was eclipsed in the 1850s by
4%
European Republicanism.
6%
The Civil War had been fought to preserve
Italian 8% German 28% the Union and American values, but these
seemed to be increasingly under threat as immi-
Other Central gration grew again after the war. Between 1865
European
10% and 1915 over 26 million immigrants arrived,
and, particularly after 1880, the so-called ‘new
immigration’ came to be dominated by people
Scandinavian from southern and eastern Europe: Italy, Austria-
11%
British 18% Hungary and Russia. By 1910 a third of the
populations of the 12 largest cities were foreign-
Irish 15%
born, while another third were children of
1860–1900
immigrants. These people tended to perform
the least desirable jobs, working long hours in
All Others
6% appalling conditions. The different customs,
German 4% poverty and illiteracy, and the fact that many
Asian 4% Italian 22%
came from non-democratic countries, led to a
Canadian 6%
second wave of nativism, which advocated
a literacy test for immigrants in their own
language. Cleveland, Taft and Wilson vetoed
literacy tests on the grounds that they measured
Other
Northwestern opportunity rather than ability, but Wilson
European capitulated in 1917 and the agitation of the
18% Austro-Hungarian
22%
Immigration Restriction League (set up in 1894
to keep ‘lesser breeds’ out) died down as a result.
Russian and Baltic states Unions also opposed immigration on the
18% grounds that foreign workers tended to drive
1900–1920 down wages, could be used to break strikes and
generally contributed to keeping the union
movement divided.
In 1882 the first restrictive immigration act was passed to ban paupers, convicts, criminals, lunatics,
the Chinese, and anyone likely to be a public charge, but it made little impact on the numbers admitted.
Immigrants became a convenient scapegoat for the problems brought by urbanisation and industrialisa-
tion, such as unemployment, strikes, crime and increasing welfare bills. In 1891 an immigration act was
passed regarding dangerous and contagious diseases, and in 1906 a Gentlemen’s Agreement gave the US
the right to exclude the Japanese. In 1907, under pressure from the Immigration Restriction League and
others, the Senate appointed the Dillingham Commission to study immigration patterns. In 1910–11 the
Commission reported that since the 1880s immigrants had mainly been southern and eastern Europeans
who were unsuited to life in the US and who were also considered to be inferior. The report recommended
the use of literacy tests for immigrants in their own language.
1111
2111
3
4111
5
6
7
8
9
10111
1
2
3
4
5
6
Figure 5.2
7
Immigrants arriving in
8
America around 1910
9
20111
1
2 Organised labour
3
4 In the 1840s less than 1 per cent of workers belonged to unions, which tended to develop far more slowly
5 in the US than in Europe. Union growth was impeded by a number of factors:
6
7 • immigrants divided by culture, religion and language, who could be used by employers for lower pay
8 and strike-breaking;
9 • a restriction of women’s and black membership;
30 • labour spies;
1 • armed force;
2 • bias of law courts against unions, often regarded as un-American and even illegal;
3 • poor leadership;
4 • divided aims, e.g. middle-class leaders tended to aim for voting rights, free education and abolition of
5 imprisonment for debt, whereas workers were more concerned with pay and conditions;
6 • fluctuating membership and low membership because workers often felt that jobs would be temporary;
7 • the Depression of the 1870s;
8 • divisions between skilled and unskilled workers (trade/labour); and
9 • the public reaction to violence during strikes.
40
1 In 1834, six craft societies united to a form a National Trades Union, which had some success before
2 the Depression of the late 1830s brought about its collapse. In Massachusetts in 1842 a court ruled that
3 trade unions were not in themselves criminal conspiracies, a ruling which other state courts often followed.
4 State laws regarding shorter hours and child labour were often undermined by parents giving permission
45 for children to work longer hours and also negotiating longer hours for themselves. In the 1860s, craft
46 unions coalesced to form national organisations – the first attempt to combine different unions into a single
47 body confederation. In 1866 William Sylvis, leader of the Iron Molders, founded the National Labor Union
48 (NLU), which lasted for six years and included trade unions, farmers’ groups and reform groups. However,
49222 the NLU began to spend more time on political issues such as currency reform and lost its way.
Many historians have glossed over the appalling conditions in which people worked during the second
half of the nineteenth century, but not so Howard Zinn (1996). He has quoted the 1889 records of the
ICC, which reveal that 22,000 railroad workers were killed or injured in that one year. He goes on to high-
light that, in 1904, 27,000 workers were killed in manufacturing, transport and agriculture, while in 1914,
35,000 workers were killed in industrial accidents, with 700,000 injured.
The 1870s, with its increased mechanisation and reduced requirement for skilled workers, saw an
increase in industrial conflict, which became more violent. The Molly Maguires, a secretive Irish organi-
sation based in the Pennsylvania anthracite areas, went on strike, murdered mine superintendents, derailed
rail cars and burned coal tips. The Pinkerton Detective Agency was called in, infiltrated the organisation
and brought about the conviction and execution of 19 ringleaders in 1876. The Great Railroad Strike of
1877 affected the whole nation and resulted in about 100 deaths and 1,000 people being jailed. Approxim-
ately 100,000 workers had gone on strike, and the railroad companies did withdraw some wage cuts, however
Hayes had to send in federal troops to restore order.
During the 1880s the dominant labour organisation was Terence Powderly’s powerful Knights of Labor,
which included farmers, capitalists, skilled and unskilled workers, blacks and whites, men and women. They
waged several successful strikes and campaigned for an eight-hour day, equal pay for women and the end
of child labour, paper money, income tax and the nationalisation of the railroads. It was perhaps the range
of their aims, together with support coming from the more extreme Socialist Labor Party and anarchists,
which led to its decline. The Haymarket Bomb of 1886 in Chicago and the subsequent execution of anar-
chist August Spies was certainly made the most of by anti-union forces.
The British-born Samuel Gompers’ American Federation of Labor, set up in 1886, became the domi-
nant labour organisation for more than a generation. It was a loose federation of national trade unions,
except for the four railway brotherhoods. It concentrated more on bread-and-butter issues such as wages,
hours and conditions. Gompers’ seemingly moderate approach helped him to win wide acceptance, but for
members of other unions life remained extremely tough.
In 1887 approximately 10,000 people went on strike for higher wages in Southern sugar plantations,
resulting in the killing of over 30 blacks by the militia and white vigilantes. Four years later 15 leaders of
an Arkansas cotton pickers’ strike were killed.
In 1891 miners of the Tennessee Coal Mining Company were asked to sign an ‘ironclad contract’
pledging that they would not strike, they would agree to be paid in scrip (a form of payment in ‘tokens’,
which had some sort of recognised financial value), and give up the right to check the weight of coal they
had mined (by which they were paid). They refused to sign, and as a consequence were evicted from their
houses and replaced by convicts. A thousand armed miners set the convicts free and the company gave up
trying to force through these changes. However, when strikes became violent they usually lost public
support, and this was something the unions could ill afford.
Such was the strength of the trusts, that even official government attempts to curb their power failed
initially. Between 1890 and 1893 of the eight cases brought against corporations, the government lost seven
and in 1895 in US v. E.C. Knight Company the Court even ruled that manufacturing was not strictly
commerce and therefore did not come under the wording of the Sherman Act. With such bias in the law
courts there is little wonder that unions struggled to make their mark.
One of the best-known strikes of the period was that of 1892 at Carnegie’s Homestead Steel plant.
Following a series of wage cuts, Andrew Carnegie and Henry Frick decided the Amalgamated Association
of Iron and Steel Workers, which was affiliated to the American Federation of Labor (AFL), had to go.
Three hundred ‘Pinkertons’ were brought in, three of whom were killed along with ten workers. The
Pinkertons surrendered to the strikers, but the governor of Pennsylvania sent in an entire state National
Guard of 8,000 to restore order. An attempt to assassinate Frick turned the public against the workers, and
finally they drifted back to work.
1111 In the same year as the Homestead Strike, Eugene Debs had formed the American Railway Union
2111 (ARU), with the aim of including all railway workers. In 1893 a third of the workers on Pullman rail cars
3 were laid off and the rest had their wages cut by 30 per cent, though rents and prices in company stores
4111 were not cut. Within days workers were out on strike in 27 states and territories. Cleveland sent 2,000
5 troops to the Chicago area and a federal court injunction based on the Sherman Anti-Trust Act ruled the
6 strike illegal. When the injunction was defied, Debs was arrested with others and imprisoned. The strike
7 quickly collapsed with 34 having died during it.
8 In 1894 Jacob Coxey led a march of unemployed to Washington to demand the creation of jobs by
9 the government and the printing of money and was arrested for trespass on the lawns of the Capitol.
10111 In 1898 John Mitchell, a former miner and self-educated man, became President of the United Mine
1 Workers of America, and went on to lead the Anthracite Coal Miners’ Strike of 1902, successfully uniting
2 immigrant groups in a campaign for better pay and conditions. Arbitrators awarded miners a 10 per cent
3 wage increase and a nine-hour day. Roosevelt had also threatened intervention against the mine owners.
4 In 1900 Mitchell joined fellow union leader Samuel Gompers and prominent businessmen, including Mark
5 Hanna and J.P. Morgan, to form the American Civic Federation, which attempted to mediate and avoid
6 conflict between employers and workers. However employers remained generally unsympathetic. Further
7 violence seemed to indicate that employers and workers would never see eye-to-eye. The 1905 murder by
8 bomb of Frank Steunenberg, ex-governor of Idaho, and the 1910 dynamiting of the ‘LA Times’ building
9 (owned by a leading supporter of the open shop), which led to the charging of members of the Iron Workers
20111 Union, also gave unions a bad reputation with the general public.
1 Nevertheless in the period of prosperity following the Spanish-American War of 1898 union member-
2 ship had grown rapidly, as had strike action. Employers formed the National Union of Manufacturers,
3 which began an aggressive open shop campaign, and the American Antiboycott Association was set up in
4 1902 to fight unions in the courts. In 1905 in Lochner v. New York, the Supreme Court held that a law
5 establishing a ten-hour day for bakers was an unjustified interference with the right of a worker to work
6 as many hours as he chose, and in the 1907 Buck’s Stove and Range Company Case a federal judge issued
7 an injunction stopping the AFL from boycotting the goods of a company which had been unfair to workers.
8 The 1908 Danbury hatters case saw the Supreme Court rule that secondary boycotts contravened the
9 Sherman Act in restraint of trade, and the Court tended to block attempts to improve working conditions
30 as violations of the 14th Amendment.
1 Both conditions and responses to industrial action remained appalling, even under so-called
2 ‘Progressive’ Presidents. In 1911 the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire claimed the lives of 146 workers, mostly young
3 women, and it emerged that the company had kept all its doors locked during working hours. The Colorado
4 Coal Strike of 1913–14 was one of the most violent industrial conflicts in US history but seems to have
5 had little or no coverage in most textbooks. The miners held out for 14 months in tents on the prairies
6 with 66 dying in conflict. Between 1884 and 1912, 43,000 coal miners had been killed in accidents in the
7 US, nearly 2,000 of these in Colorado mines where the death rate was twice the national average. ‘Packed’
8 coroners’ juries almost always reached verdicts which absolved the coal companies from responsibility
9 for their workers, most of whom were immigrants from eastern and southern Europe. The most notorious
40 and horrific incident of the Colorado strike was the Ludlow Massacre of April 1914 at the mines of the
1 Rockefeller-owned Colorado Fuel and Iron Company. The Rockefellers had hired the Baldwin Felts
2 Detective Agency to help break the strike and the National Guard were also called in on behalf of the mine
3 operators, intimidating miners and protecting strike-breakers. On 20 April, the miners’ tents were machine-
4 gunned and torched, with 26 killed, including 2 women and 11 children, who had suffocated in a pit dug
45 under their tent. Following the incident miners went on the rampage and federal troops had to be sent
46 in to restore order. Not one militia man or mine guard was indicted over the deaths. In 1915 a federal
47 commission reported that between a third and a half of all American wage-earning families lived below
48 the poverty line.
49222
Figure 5.3
The Ludlow Massacre
By 1914 the AFL had over 2 million members, but this was only 11 per cent of the non-agricultural
workforce in the US, although the much smaller Industrial Workers of the World (‘Wobblies’), an anarcho-
syndicalist union movement set up in 1905, gained as much coverage. The Wobblies were committed to
fight capitalism and unite the workers of the world. They were hated and feared by employers for their
‘free speech campaigns’ and aggressive leadership of strikes, and they were to be the main victims of the
anti-radical hysteria of the First World War and the ‘Red Scare’ of 1919.
Part 2: Essays
Reconstruction
1 Why did white Southerners resent Reconstruction, and to what extent did they manage to
undermine the process? (20)
(AQA)
In short, Reconstruction was essentially about the abolition of slavery and the attempts to enfranchise blacks
and give them equality with whites. Southern whites who had been used to treating blacks as an inferior
people were bound to be resentful, although the initial terms of Reconstruction laid down by Presidents
Lincoln and Johnson did not seem too harsh as far as Southern whites were concerned, and resentment at
that time was minimal.
Johnson quickly recognised the restored governments in Virginia, Louisiana, Arkansas and Tennessee,
indicating he would recognise the other seven if they ratified the 13th Amendment, and held elections for
state governments and Congress. He issued a general pardon to those who would take an oath of allegiance,
and granted many individual requests for pardons. He even said voting qualifications should be left to the
states. Southern voting for prominent ex-Confederates and the Black Codes designed by Southern states
to keep blacks ‘in their place’ infuriated the North, and by 1867 Presidential Reconstruction had become
Congressional or Radical Reconstruction, dominated by Radical Republicans such as Benjamin Wade and
ESSAYS • 111
1111 Thaddeus Stevens. They were wholly committed not just to the emancipation of slaves but to equality for
2111 blacks, which included the right to vote and recognition as citizens. For Southern whites accustomed to
3 viewing blacks as inferior this was to be a hard pill to swallow. In addition, the criteria for readmission to
4111 the Union were to be made tougher than Lincoln and Johnson had set out, and in 1867, as a result of the
5 First (Military) Reconstruction Act, the South (apart from Tennessee) was divided up into five military
6 districts and run by Union generals who were to ensure elections were conducted fairly. Opponents of the
7 Act vented their frustrations by lynching hundreds of blacks despite the presence of Union soldiers.
8 Reconstruction Acts between 1867 and 1868 invalidated the state governments recognised by Lincoln
9 and Johnson as well as a number of pardons. For another ten years the military and Republicans ran the
10111 South, while thousands of Southern whites were barred from voting and holding office. The Union League
1 often marked ballots for blacks, falsely registered them and stuffed ballot boxes, giving rise to such later
2 interpretations of Reconstruction as those given by Dunning, who labelled the period ‘Black Recon-
3 struction’, regarding it as undemocratic and dominated by corrupt Radicals who were essentially agents of
4 Northern capitalism. Historians Franklin and Stampp came to regard Reconstruction as lenient for whites
5 in many respects.
6 It is interesting to note that Northern businessmen moving south after the war were often welcomed
7 initially given the money they brought to invest, but soon became resented as ‘carpet-baggers’ out to make
8 a profit from Southern misfortune. Southerners who collaborated with Republicans were dubbed ‘scalawags’
9 and suffered much abuse. The Southern economy remained in a poor state as blacks often chose to work
20111 less hard than they had done under slavery, and even the falling price of cotton in 1872 was blamed on
1 Republican administrations. It is certainly true that the spending of local government increased and there
2 was white resentment towards the work of the Freedmen’s Bureau (although it did not exclusively help
3 blacks). Great achievements were made, however, particularly in education, but even this was resented as
4 it gave blacks ‘ideas above their station’ as far as whites were concerned.
5 There is no doubt that unscrupulous Northerners took advantage of conditions in the South, and men
6 such as Wade were clearly motivated by the political advantages of enfranchising blacks, but equally there
7 were many men of great integrity among the Republicans, and Thaddeus Stevens’ commitment to the black
8 cause was so deep that even in death he was buried in a black cemetery.
9 Southern whites resented the abolition of slavery in itself, and further resented the 14th Amendment
30 which established that there would be: no compensation for loss of slaves; penalties for any state denying
1 black suffrage; a disqualification of ex-Confederates from office; and black citizenship. The 15th
2 Amendment, which effectively enforced black suffrage, was another much resented measure which also led
3 to black voters outnumbering whites in five Southern states – although only in one state did blacks ever
4 form a majority of the legislature. ‘Blue-bellied’ Union troops in the South remained as a visible reminder
5 in some areas of the lost war and the dominance of the North over the South.
6 In many ways Reconstruction was undermined as much by the North as by Southern whites. Many in
7 the North became disappointed with Republican manipulation of blacks and carpet-bag corruption, uneasy
8 about the extent of federal intervention and the use of the military, and came to take the view that blacks
9 at some point must fend for themselves. Animosities towards the South declined over time, while some of
40 the Radicals died or mellowed. The 1872 Amnesty Act restored political rights to all but a few hundred ex-
1 Confederates, and in the same year the Freedmen’s Bureau was allowed to lapse. Political scandal in the
2 North distracted attention away from the South, as did the economic depression of 1873. The Civil Rights
3 Act of 1875 guaranteeing equal rights in public places was never enforced, and President Grant became
4 increasingly reluctant to use the Force Acts. Southern Republicanism became divided over issues such as
45 racism and economic and social policy, and its support from the North dwindled. Having said all that,
46 Southern whites did their fair share of undermining as well.
47 The fact that the Confederacy had lost the war seemed to make little difference to many Southern
48 whites, and from the early days of Reconstruction attempts were made to undermine its effectiveness,
49222 usually through intimidation and violence. In 1865, according to Foner, over 2,000 blacks were killed in
the Shreveport area of Louisiana alone. Across the South, freedmen were routinely assaulted or murdered
if they attempted to leave plantations, as fear of black uprisings haunted the South. The Black Codes were
initially an attempt to keep blacks in their place by a series of spurious laws, ostensibly aimed at preserving
law and order, but Northerners saw them for what they were and members of Congress acted quickly to
override such measures.
Of the covert and less covert paramilitary organisations set up by Southern whites to undermine
Reconstruction, the Ku Klux Klan was the best known, although other groups such as the Red Shirts and
White League ‘policed’ elections. At its peak, the Klan had possibly over half a million members, but the
Force Acts helped break the Klan during Grant’s Presidency.
It was not long however before Southern whites, encouraged by the waning enthusiasm in the North
in the 1870s, devised the Mississippi Plan (in 1874) to force all whites into the Democrat party and clubs,
and to persuade blacks either not to vote or to vote Democrat. Blacks involved in politics were denied jobs
and intimidated. Grant failed to intervene in Mississippi, and the South had effectively been redeemed.
The compromise made in the wake of the disputed 1876 Presidential election was at the expense of
blacks in the South and signalled the end of Reconstruction. Southern whites began to consolidate the
gains they had been making since the late 1860s in some areas. Alan Farmer ultimately sees Reconstruction
as a success for Southern whites, which would imply that it was undermined to a great extent. The ‘Jim
Crow’ laws which followed soon after would ensure that blacks were treated as second-class citizens in the
South for decades to come. Nonetheless, blacks had made great progress in education, church organisa-
tion and economic areas, and would continue to do so. After 1877 the ex-Confederate states came under
the control of white Redeemers or Bourbons, and, according to Foner, a ‘dark night of injustice settled
over the South.’
Big business
2 Assess the impact of big business on the US in the period 1865 to 1890. (20)
(AQA)
The term ‘the Gilded Age’, taken from a novel by Mark Twain and Charles Warner, has been used to ridicule
the materialism and unequal economic growth of the 25 years following the Civil War, a time when the vast
majority of people lived in poverty and squalor, while wealthy entrepreneurs amassed huge personal fortunes,
when party machines and corruption dominated government and political life, and the power of big busi-
ness came to threaten enterprise and even democracy. Big business had a huge impact on American life after
the Civil War, and can be seen to have affected it in economic, social, political and psychological ways.
As far as the economy was concerned big business turned the US into the foremost industrial power
in the world. Trusts, and concentrations of wealth and power, threatened competition with monopolistic
practices, stifled individualism with increased mechanisation of production, and intimidated rivals out of
the market with predatory pricing and other underhand methods. These ideas were the basis of the first
trust formed in 1882, Standard Oil of Ohio. Trusts undoubtedly had a tendency to eliminate weaker
competitors, but it could be argued that this created greater stability in the economy, in which companies
could thrive without the additional worry about competition and pricing. It did however mean that the
whole concept of the free market and competition became something of a sham, not that that worried the
likes of the Rockefellers and Carnegies of the ‘Gilded Age’. It could be contended that, as Carnegie gave
away much of his fortune to worthy causes, the system benefited everyone. However, not all businessmen
were so charitable, and the great steel magnate’s philanthropic works certainly did not overshadow the
unscrupulous dealings of those involved in such scandals as Credit Mobilier or the Erie Railroad.
As businesses grew and cities sprang up around them the social make-up of America began to change.
A new business elite emerged alongside wage labourers, many of them immigrants, or the children of
ESSAYS • 113
1111 immigrants. The speed at which big business grew was too fast to have been achieved with social justice,
2111 and government at all levels could not keep up with the social problems that went with the rise of big busi-
3 ness and the growth of the cities. Jacob Riis’s exposé of the New York slums in 1890 came as a startling
4111 revelation to many, previously unaware of ‘how the other half lived’. Municipal authorities did what they
5 could to deal with the worst of the overcrowding, disease, poor sanitation, terrible working conditions and
6 crime, which went hand-in-hand with urban growth, but it never seemed to be enough. For example in
7 the first week of July 1877, 139 babies died in Baltimore, where liquid sewage ran through the streets.
8 But it was not just city dwellers affected by the changing economy. The perception among farmers that
9 their interests were being sacrificed to those of big business during the period also grew, and culminated
10111 in much successful political agitation, as their incomes fell in real terms and banks continued to foreclose
1 on mortgages. Big business, of course, if it was to expand, needed a continuous supply of unskilled and
2 cheap labour, and this in part came from the immigrants who had come to America before and after the
3 war. In a way, therefore, it can be argued that business stimulated the growth in immigration after the war,
4 and helped to create a more cosmopolitan society, which of course raised many problems of its own.
5 Politically, big business came to dominate politics, from the bosses at city level (such as William Tweed
6 in New York) to the funding of candidates and even members of the cabinet at federal level. A contem-
7 porary magazine, Forum (16), complained about the railway companies securing the nominations of their
8 friends at political conventions and controlling state legislatures. And by 1890 railroad revenue was well
9 over double that of federal government. Milton Goldin has argued that people came to realise that those
20111 who sought to control both markets and workers and the legal system might also seek greater political
1 power. Porter has argued that the positive benefits outweighed the threat to democracy but Arnesen used
2 the term ‘robber baron’ for the men who accumulated such power. The year 1888 held the most corrupt
3 Presidential election in American history, with the Republicans outbidding rivals to win control of both
4 Houses and the McKinley Tariff Act of 1890 was seen as payback time for the Republicans’ financial backers.
5 Little wonder that government and the Supreme Court supported big business.
6 The psychological impact of big business is harder to assess. By 1890 there were still more people living
7 in rural areas than in the cities but the US was a long way from the republic of farmers that Thomas
8 Jefferson had envisaged 100 years earlier. The official closing of the frontier in 1890 was another reason
9 for Americans to question the long-term future. Despite the cities becoming the dominant influence
30 in American society by the end of the nineteenth century, people still mythologised the West and the
1 frontier, and longed for a time and a place (which had probably never existed) when individuals could
2 make a difference.
3 Big business turned the US into the world’s greatest industrial and, ultimately, political power. How-
4 ever, internally it shaped the country to value material progress above all else, and made it economically
5 and socially unequal.
6
7 3 (a) Account for the rapid rise of big business in the 1880s and 1890s. (30)
8
(b) How far did the power of big business threaten democracy in the US in the period
9
1890 to 1914? (60)
40
(OCR)
1
2
3 Essay plan
4
Part (a)
45
46 Introduction: Stress a range of factors involved and mention some of them.
47 Para 1: Consider long-term context, e.g. raw materials, laissez-faire government, large supply of cheap
48 unskilled labour, . . .
49222
Para 2: Consider the war as a possible catalyst in terms of large-scale production.

Para 3: Methods of businessmen, e.g. corruption and tendency towards creation of trusts; link to para 4.
Para 4: Look at the role of the railroads
Conclusion: Conclude with long-term and short-term factors, picking out the most significant.
Part (b)
Introduction: Give the line of argument you broadly intend to follow.
Para 1: Consider the amassing of wealth by a small group of people in society and the implications.
Para 2: Examine corruption on a local scale, e.g. city bosses such as William Tweed.
Para 3: Look at power of the railroads and bribery of federal government; perhaps consider the 1888
Presidential election.
Para 4: Examine the tendency of federal government to side with big business against unions.
Para 5: Consider the argument that big business did not threaten democracy greatly, citing the action taken
to curb monopoly and influence, e.g. during the ‘Progressive age’.
Conclusion: Weigh up extent to which big business threatened democracy.
The West
4 What role did the government play in encouraging westward movement between
1865 and 1890? (20)
(AQA)
The traditional image of rugged individuals, pioneers and wagon trains blazing a trail westwards against
the elements and the Indians owes as much to popular fiction, art and cinema as to anything else. That is
not to say that the likes of Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone did not exist, but in reality most of the west-
wards expansion was much less romantic, and was heavily influenced by government intervention and big
business, particularly the construction of the railroads and the spread of towns rather than homesteads.
As early as 1850 Congress granted nearly four million acres of public land to help finance the Illinois
Central Railroad from Chicago to New Orleans and over the next ten years gave 18 million acres to the
railroads. In 1869 the first transcontinental railroad was complete and by 1893 another four transcontinental
lines had been built, facilitating settlement, creating new markets for western products, and generally stim-
ulating growth. The government’s generosity with public land was not confined to the railroads, and between
1862 and 1900 it gave out 80 million acres of land under the Homestead Act. Much was bought up by
speculators, mining and lumber companies, and cattlemen, rather than individuals who often could not
afford to buy 160 acres, which in any case was too small a plot by which to make a living on the Great
Plains. Potential settlers also lacked the money for seeds, animals and equipment. Later land grants under
the 1873 Timber Culture Act and 1877 Desert Land Act tended to further obstruct genuine settlement. The
advertising campaigns and the colonising activities of the railroads contributed far more to settlement than
the public land policy had, but the government’s role was not just about land policy.
One of the key roles performed by the federal government to encourage westwards expansion was the
gradual removal of the Plains Indians to reservations, but this was not to be without a fight. In the 1860s
all Plains Indians were brought onto reservations in the Black Hills of Dakota and what would later become
ESSAYS • 115
1111 Oklahoma. When gold was discovered in the Black Hills in 1875 the government broke its promise to guar-
2111 antee the areas, and prospectors flooded in. Under the leadership of Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, Native
3 Americans gathered in Montana. The Seventh Cavalry under George Armstrong Custer was sent to assess
4111 the situation, but Custer exceeded his orders and, in 1876, at Little Big Horn, he and his command were
5 wiped out. Nonetheless, the writing was on the wall for the Indians, and it was only a matter of time before
6 superior numbers and resources prevailed. Sitting Bull surrendered in 1881, and in 1886 Geronimo’s
7 Apaches were defeated. Organised resistance seemed to be at an end, although there was to be one final
8 chapter at Wounded Knee in 1890, where a Sioux band led by Big Foot on its way to a reservation was
9 gunned down by the Seventh Cavalry, leaving 200 Indians including many women and children dead in
10111 the snow.
1 Government action had played a crucial role in the removal of the Plains tribes but other factors had
2 also conspired against them: the railroads, the electric telegraph, the Winchester repeating rifle, the system-
3 atic destruction of the buffalo (over 12 million killed in the 20 years following the war), and white attitudes
4 in general. The final insult to a once proud people was to attempt to convert them to white ways. The
5 Indian Rights Association and National Indian Defense Association in the 1870s and 1880s persuaded the
6 government to break down the tribal structure and to attempt to assimilate Indians. Youngsters were sent
7 to boarding schools, while Indian religions were outlawed, and the 1887 Dawes Act broke up reservation
8 land into individual plots, which allowed land-grabbing by whites. Given the widespread belief in John
9 O’Sullivan’s ‘manifest destiny’ of white Americans to overspread the continent, it is perhaps not surprising
20111 that the fate of the Indians was such.
1 The discovery of precious minerals such as gold, silver and copper (which came into its own with the
2 advent of electricity) may not have been carried out by government, but the government usually helped to
3 open up and expand mining following initial discoveries, and the lone prospector panning for gold was
4 usually very quickly replaced by corporate intervention. Inventions also played their part in westwards
5 expansion. The refrigerator car turned cattle drivers into ranchers, while barbed wire, wells, windmills and
6 better ploughs all had an influence on people deciding to take their chances in the West.
7
8
9 Immigration and government intervention
30
1 5 (a) Assess the changing nature of immigration to the US after the Civil War and the impact
2 it had on American society up to 1890. (30)
3
4 (b) To what extent did federal intervention in social and economic areas increase during
5 the years 1865 to 1919? (60)
6 (OCR)
7
8 (a) Up until the Civil War immigrants to the US had essentially come from Britain, Germany and Ireland
9 and were generally northern and western European in origin. The bulk of Irish immigrants were Catholics
40 and hostility to them had arisen in the 1850s with the upsurge of nativism. In the years following the war
1 however, the pattern of immigration shifted to the countries of southern and eastern Europe, and partic-
2 ularly after 1880 the cities of the east became even more diverse places than they had been before. Millions
3 of immigrants from countries such as Italy, Austria-Hungary, Russia and China came into the country.
4 Five times as many people (over 26 million) came into the country in the 50 years after the war as
45 came in the 50 years before. The so-called ‘new immigrants’ came to the US for similar reasons to their
46 predecessors, a mixture of religious and political persecution and economic hardship.
47 The sheer number of immigrants provided a willing and cheap workforce on which American economic
48 prosperity could be based. The immigrants were prepared to work in terrible conditions and to put up
49222 with appallingly squalid living conditions. They were also useful when employers wanted to break strikes
by existing workers, and were often brought in as blackleg labour, to the strong objections from the unions.
A number of Presidents refused to bring in a literacy test for immigrants on the grounds that it measured
opportunity rather than ability, and had it been enforced in the past would have excluded hundreds of
thousands who had since made a valuable contribution to the economy.
White Anglo-Saxon Protestant America in the 1880s, typified by groups such as the anti-Catholic
American Protective Association, made immigrants the scapegoats for the increase in strikes, unemploy-
ment, crime and welfare costs, which were in reality the products of industrialisation, urbanisation and a
capitalist economy that exploited workers and peaked and troughed seemingly at will. The move towards
greater violence in industrial disputes was also blamed on immigrants, with such incidents as the Haymarket
Bomb, which implicated German anarchists, confirming suspicions. The 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act
reflected a growing resentment on the west coast towards those from the Far East. The constant arrival of
immigrants also provided corrupt political machines with willing supporters and voters who could be found
jobs in return. The ‘Boss’ and ‘Padrone’ systems of the big cities demonstrated a negative impact of immi-
gration, though it could be argued that those newly arrived in America were simply voting in their own
interests – which is just what other Americans had always done.
In the short term immigration contributed enormously to American prosperity, became a significant
part of the social problems in the US, prompting intervention by the federal government on a far greater
scale in the next century, and generally undermined (perhaps permanently) the development of unions.
Immigrants also contributed to a diverse and creative culture in the cities of the East.
(b) The period of Reconstruction saw government intervention on an unprecedented level, including the
13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution, a series of laws regarding enforcement, the
Freedmen’s Bureau and the use of a military force of occupation; but by 1877 the experiment seemed to
be over, and federal government once again took a back seat. Local governments in the states and the cities
were often the first to take action to ensure fairness and better conditions, and it would take Washington
a long time to acknowledge that certain issues required direct intervention.
As well as Reconstruction, which essentially applied to the South, the government gave a great deal of
support to westwards expansion, granting land and money for internal improvements, encouraging the
railroads, and using troops where necessary to put down the threat from Native Americans. In the country
as a whole, government intervention can usefully be broken down into the areas of: economic regulation,
labour/welfare/consumerism, the environment, finance and repression.
The setting up in 1887 of the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a landmark for govern-
ment regulation of the economy, as it established a precedent for the monitoring of big business. Many
have argued that it lacked effectiveness with its early rulings being constantly challenged and overturned
but nevertheless it was the first independent regulatory agency, and in 1906 and 1910 respectively the
Hepburn Act and the Mann-Elkins Act extended the ICC’s powers and jurisdiction. Despite the fact that,
in the 1880s, 27 states and territories mainly in the South and the West had passed laws prohibiting trusts,
trusts often transferred their headquarters to states with more lenient laws such as New Jersey. Nor were
states allowed to interfere with interstate commerce. In 1890 therefore the Sherman Anti-Trust Act was
passed, ostensibly aimed at curbing the power of the trusts, but later used to penalise trade unions acting
in restraint of trade, and frequently successfully challenged by the businesses it hoped to regulate. In fact
in many respects the government remained more inclined to support big business than to restrict it, and
this was demonstrated when federal troops were sent in to break the Pullman Strike of 1894, although
governments argued that they were safeguarding the national interest in such cases. It could sometimes,
however, work the other way, as in 1902 when Theodore Roosevelt threatened the mine owners with a
federal takeover if they did not talk with the workers. He also resurrected the Sherman Act when he came
to office and dissolved the vast Northern Securities Company of J.P. Morgan, as well as using the law against
a further 44 corporations. His successor William Taft brought twice as many prosecutions as Roosevelt.
Wilson never showed such enthusiasm, however. Nonetheless, during his Presidency the Federal Trade
ESSAYS • 117
1111 Commission Act established a Commission to regulate and investigate business practices; and the Clayton
2111 Act of 1914 was passed against price discrimination that led to monopoly. The role of government with
3 regard to business was very much one of regulation rather than suppression. At heart, even ‘trust-buster’
4111 Roosevelt believed big business was good for America.
5 The period also saw major advances made regarding labour, welfare and consumer issues. The 1890
6 Dependent Pensions Bill doubled the number of pensioners, while in the same year Jacob Riis’s exposé,
7 How the Other Half Lives, brought about changes in attitudes towards poverty. The climate of Progressivism
8 influenced landmark measures such as the 1906 Meat Inspection Act and Pure Food and Drug Act aimed
9 at improving conditions of work and the quality of goods produced. The Department of Labor and Federal
10111 Children’s Bureau were also set up under Taft along with post office savings banks. The 1916 first federal
1 child labour law was created by the Keating-Owen Act, and under Wilson the first federal workmen’s
2 compensation laws to cover federal employees was established by the Kern-McGillicuddy Act. The Adamson
3 Act regarding the railways was the first federal law to guarantee workers an eight-hour day.
4 One of Roosevelt’s projects was to prevent private interests exploiting certain natural resources of the
5 country by setting aside vast areas of land for the public. He utilised the 1891 Forest Reserve Act and
6 Newlands Act of 1902 most effectively in spite of having to face quite a lot of opposition from members
7 of Congress.
8 The government had in the past taken action over such issues as the currency, for example the Sherman
9 Silver Purchase Act of 1890, and for decades of course the tariff had been one of the areas in which the
20111 federal government had regularly intervened, usually to raise duties, but in 1913 the Underwood-Simmons
1 Act bucked the trend when it lowered rates. During Wilson’s Presidency 12 Federal Reserve Banks were
2 also set up by the government.
3 Federal government reaction to strike action had at times been repressive but during the First World
4 War measures took on a more sinister tone. In 1917/18 the Espionage, Sabotage and Sedition Acts were
5 passed, and a number of arrests of members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) were made as
6 a result. The Committee on Public Information spread tales of German atrocities and encouraged people
7 to inform on neighbours acting suspiciously. In 1918 over 11,000 people were arrested for criticising either
8 the government or the war effort.
9 There is no doubt that intervention by the federal government in social and economic areas increased
30 significantly during the years 1865 to 1919. Reconstruction brought with it much activity and set a prece-
1 dent for future intervention, but did not last beyond 1877. State and city governments often took the lead
2 during the ‘Gilded Age’ in attempting to redress the economic and social problems the country was expe-
3 riencing, but gradually, partly due to the influence of Progressivism, those in Washington came to take
4 greater responsibility for the problems that had arisen during industrialisation. Welfare and labour rights
5 still lagged behind Europe by the end of the First World War but great strides had been made in several
6 areas, and precedents had been established for future intervention.
7
8
PRACTICE QUESTION
9
40 6 How successfully did the federal government respond to the problems brought by
1 industrialisation and urbanisation between 1870 and 1890? (20)
2 (AQA)
3
4 Advice: This question effectively focuses on the so-called ‘Gilded Age’. Industrialisation and urbanisation went
45 hand-in-hand in late nineteenth-century America, but brought different problems. It is important to note that
46 the question only expects you to go up to 1890, which means that the impact of Progressivism cannot be included
47 in the answer, and the question also specifies ‘federal government’ which means that city and state government
48 responses cannot be included in their own right either. Problems could be themed under such headings as political,
49222 economic and social, while the general line of the answer should probably be that the federal government did
not respond particularly successfully during the period: the violent nature of strikes and the publication of Jacob
Riis’s How the Other Half Lives bearing testament to that.
7 How far did the power of government increase between 1865 and 1890? (20)
(AQA)
Essay plan
Introduction: Overview of whether power did in fact increase and whether it was permanent.
Para 1: Examine period of Reconstruction in terms of amendments to the Constitution and legislation,
and assess whether Reconstruction resulted in a permanent shift in power given its ending in 1877.
Para 2: Examine legislation after 1877 and areas in which the government intervened.
Para 3: Assess whether the Supreme Court curbed the intentions of federal government in any way
Para 4: Analyse role that Presidents played during the period.
Para 5: Look at role played by government at a lower level and whether it suggests federal government
was doing relatively little.
Conclusion: The extent to which the power of federal government changed.
PRACTICE QUESTION
8 ‘The US had become a more democratic country by 1890 than it had been in 1840.’
Discuss. (20)
(AQA)
Advice: To answer this question well it is necessary at some point to define the term democracy by discussing
such issues as liberty, equality, individual rights, etc. The question is a broad one and an answer could cover:
the experiences of a range of groups in the US, including African Americans, women, Native Americans,
ethnic groups such as Irish Catholics and the Chinese; Constitutional/legal definitions linked to democracy; the
impact of big business on politics; the economic inequalities in the country; and the extension of government
intervention.
Labour and Populism
9 (a) What were the causes of Populism? (30)
(b) Account for the failure of the labour movement to achieve greater gains more quickly
towards the end of the nineteenth century. (60)
(OCR)
(a) After the Civil War farmers in America suffered from declining status, but this was within an inter-
national context of overproduction that particularly hit wheat farmers and cotton planters because of their
overseas markets. In 1867 the first national farmers’ organisation, the National Grange of the Patrons of
Husbandry, was set up with essentially social, cooperational and educational aims, although motivation
gradually became more political.
ESSAYS • 119
1111 The Granger movement raised issues linked to railroad regulation, which it clearly felt was not strong
2111 enough. Populists resented the emphasis placed on property rights, the unfairness of business monopoly,
3 Social Darwinism and laissez-faire, and the uneven distribution of wealth in general. Farmers believed they
4111 were being sacrificed to keep the US on the gold standard as a result of the influence of London bankers,
5 especially the Rothschilds (there was even an anti-Semitic element in later years).
6 The increased mechanisation of agriculture had led to great efficiency gains but also brought prob-
7 lems for independent farmers in terms of actually being able to afford machines and repairs. There had
8 been a growth in specialisation of farm products, but most farmers had stuck to traditional crops, and often
9 invested everything in monoculture. After the war there was an increase in agricultural exports, leaving
10111 farmers open to exploitation as markets came to depend on factors beyond their control, for example: busi-
1 ness cycles, credit, transport, labour supply, price structure and government policies. As new agricultural
2 lands became available, the price of land went up but crop prices fell, and the farmers had to mortgage
3 property to put more land under cultivation. In the 1870s and 1880s there was unusually high rainfall
4 which helped the farmers in the short term, but big business and bankers charged farmers very high interest
5 on their mortgages, and when drought struck the mid-west in 1886 it was disastrous.
6 The fact that Populism actually manifested itself in three main groupings would suggest that motives
7 varied from region to region, but in 1892 the Farmers’ and Laborers’ Union of America (from the south-
8 west, with three million members by 1890), the Northwest Farmers’ Alliance (from the mid-west, with two
9 million members by 1890) and the Colored Farmers National Alliance (from the South and mid-west, with
20111 a membership of 1–1.5 million by 1890) held a joint convention, setting out a number of demands: the
1 permanent union of all working classes; wealth for the workers; government ownership of rail; government
2 ownership of all communications systems; a more flexible and fairer distribution of the national currency;
3 low interest loans; free and unlimited coinage of silver; no more ownership of land by those who did not
4 actually use it; the secret ballot, initiative, referendum, recall and directive; a shorter working day; and
5 immigration restrictions. In short a platform that endorsed greater government intervention in the econ-
6 omy, major financial changes tending towards inflation, and a number of progressive political ideas that
7 would enhance democracy within the country. Within 20 years some of the Populists’ less radical demands
8 became law: the secret ballot, a graduated income tax and the direct elections of senators.
9
30 (b) In broad terms the problems which held back the progress of the labour movement in the United States
1 consisted of: internal divisions and the problems of unifying labour; general opposition from the govern-
2 ment, the courts and employers; and the widespread perception that unions were somehow un-American.
3 Immigration, which provided such a huge number of workers for the economy, kept wages down.
4 Workers from abroad were often unskilled, which diluted their bargaining power, while religious, language
5 and cultural divisions tended to work against those from different national and ethnic groups coming
6 together to form unions. Workers also often felt that jobs would be temporary. Immigrants and blacks
7 both tended to be unpopular among longer-established groups because they were often used by employers
8 to break strikes. Immigrants were not the only group which found it difficult to either set up or join
9 unions. Women were often refused membership, as were blacks, and skilled unions would not admit
40 unskilled labourers. There were, however, despite the sheer size and diversity of the workforce, attempts
1 to form national unions through confederations of different unions. In 1866 William Sylvis founded the
2 National Labor Union, but unfortunately most of its leaders were more concerned with long-term political,
3 economic and social reform than the immediate problems of the workers, and the movement lasted for
4 only six years. Leadership could often be a problem in terms of individual personalities and also aims.
45 Middle-class leaders tended to prioritise voting rights and free education, and the abolition of imprison-
46 ment for debt, over the bread-and-butter issues that were important to workers. Nor did the economic
47 situation help, with membership declining steeply during the Depression of the 1870s.
48 In the 1880s Terence Powderly’s Knights of Labor became the dominant labour organisation incorp-
49222 orating blacks, farmers, skilled and unskilled workers, and women. By 1886 it embraced 700,000 working
people, but it had also attracted too many radical allies such as the Socialist Labor Party and various anarchist
groups. By 1890 membership of the Knights of Labor had declined to 100,000, and within a few years it
had ceased to function. In 1886 the American Federation of Labor was set up by Samuel Gompers and
it was able to fill the gap left by the Knights. It was a loose federation of national trade unions (excepting
the four railway brotherhoods), but it was less political than the Knights, concentrating on skilled workers
and sticking to wages, hours and conditions, accepting the existing economic system and rejecting ideas
for a separate Labor Party.
A major reason for the slow progress of unions in the late nineteenth century was that the employers
were invariably hostile to unions and equally invariably the authorities sided with the employers, and this
seems to have been particularly the case in the US. In the 1870s Pinkerton detectives were called in by mine
owners in Pennsylvania to infiltrate ‘the Molly Maguires’, a militant secretive labour organisation, resulting
in the execution of nine ringleaders in 1876 following a campaign of violence against the mine companies.
In the Great Railroad Strike of 1877, 25 men were killed in a fight with the state militia, and federal
troops were eventually sent in. In 1887 a strike for higher wages on a Louisiana sugar plantation led to the
massacre of over 100 blacks by the militia and white vigilantes. Four years later 15 leaders of an Arkansas
cotton pickers’ strike were killed, including 9 lynched after they had been arrested. And during the 1894
Pullman Strike, federal troops were sent to Chicago and a federal injunction was taken out (based on the
Sherman Anti-Trust Act) forbidding the union to continue its strike.
Presidents remained generally unsympathetic towards labour until the 1900s and public attitudes were
adversely influenced by the violence connected to strikes. There might often be support initially when strikes
started peacefully, but once violence crept in public support tended to shift away from the strikers: for
example, during the Homestead Steel Strike, especially after the attempt by an anarchist to kill plant manager
Henry Frick. The Haymarket Bomb of 1886 was also linked to labour agitation. Union membership
remained extremely low in comparison to countries such as Great Britain during the same period, and the
ethos prevailed that there was somehow something un-American about joining a union, something that
went against the grain of ‘rugged individualism’ and self-sufficiency.
Progressivism
10 (a) Explain the origins of Progressivism. (30)
(b) To what extent did Roosevelt prove to be a more progressive President than Taft
or Wilson? (60)
(OCR)
(a) Prior to the 1950s most historians agreed that Progressivism was a movement by the people to curb
the power of special interest groups, but during that decade writers argued that Progressive leaders certainly
in some areas tended to be from a privileged elite who were suffering either a loss of economic or psycho-
logical status against the rise of big business. Gabriel Kolko in the 1960s argued that Progressivism was
actually used by business leaders to protect themselves against competition, while others saw it as busi-
nesses and the professional middle classes wanting to bring order and efficiency to the political and economic
life of the country. In 1981 Richard McCormick argued that during the Progressive era pressure groups
came to the fore as political parties went into decline. Ultimately Progressivism was very diverse, which is
why it has attracted a range of interpretations.
Back in 1881 Henry Demarest Lloyd exposed Standard Oil in The Atlantic Monthly, and this can be
seen as a sign of a growing collective will to tackle the problems of an urbanised and industrialised society
which included: corruption in politics, Prohibition, votes for women, local government reform, working
conditions, child labour, regulation of the economy, public health, housing, crime (in the 1880s the murder
rate quadrupled) and conservation.
ESSAYS • 121
1111 It certainly seems that Progressivism originated with mainly well-educated middle-class urban dwellers
2111 and crossed party boundaries. Progressives saw the problems of trusts and monopolistic practices, but
3 recoiled from violent strikes, and had concerns about the impact of immigration, which they may have felt
4111 damaged the cohesion of society. It seems likely that they saw issues in moral terms rather than in a cynical
5 light connected to loss of status in a changing world. Particular stimuli, such as Jacob Riis’s How the Other
6 Half Lives, played their part in inspiring Progressivism, but the movement was diverse and had a number
7 of motives behind it, which were not always obviously connected.
8
9 (b) In 1902 miners strike arbitrators awarded strikers a 10 per cent wage increase and a nine-hour day.
10111 Theodore Roosevelt threatened government intervention if the mine owners did not come to terms. In the
1 same year he shocked the business world by using the Sherman Anti-Trust Act to dissolve J.P. Morgan’s
2 Northern Securities holding company. In spite of this, Roosevelt’s rhetoric was often more radical than his
3 actions, and he preferred regulation to trust-busting essentially believing that big business was in the national
4 interest. Accordingly in 1903 he set up the Bureau of Corporations to investigate trust abuses, and proceeded
5 to use the Sherman Act against 44 corporations – although more trusts were actually set up under Roosevelt
6 than had been under McKinley. However, Taft’s ‘trust-busting’ credentials are, on paper at least, more
7 impressive than Roosevelt’s. He pursued twice as many anti-trust suits in four years as his predecessor had
8 in seven. In addition, Roosevelt’s second term was in some ways less impressive than his first, but the
9 Hepburn Act allowed for greater railroad regulation and extended the powers of the ICC. The Meat
20111 Inspection Act and Pure Food and Drug Act were also landmark measures. The Newlands Act of 1902
1 permitted land reclamation and the irrigation of millions of acres of western land, while the 1891 Forest
2 Reserve Act was used to protect 150 million acres of forest land. Before standing down as President he
3 called for a more widespread eight-hour day, income tax, death duties, a limit on the use of injunctions in
4 strikes, federal supervision of the stock market and workmen’s compensation laws. Roosevelt was certainly
5 not against capitalism but he did see the social problems such a system brought with it. He also remained
6 acutely worried about the rise of socialism in the face of the reluctance of big business to reform itself, and
7 the implications this might have for society. Having said that, some of Roosevelt’s actions were genuinely
8 progressive.
9 Taft, although effectively nominated by Roosevelt as his successor, was altogether a more conservative
30 figure, but nonetheless included GEC and US Steel among his prosecutions. During his leadership the
1 Republicans split on the tariff and other issues, with the conservatives (or ‘standpatters’) favoured by Taft
2 taking on the insurgents (or Progressives) who were against a high tariff. Despite such internal acrimony,
3 the 1910 Mann-Elkins Act extended the jurisdiction of the ICC, and post office savings banks, a Department
4 of Labor and Federal Children’s Bureau, an eight-hour day for federal workers, safety legislation for miners,
5 the 16th Amendment for income tax and 17th Amendment for the direct election of senators were all estab-
6 lished. Ultimately, however, Taft sided with the old guard which controlled the party machine, and annoyed
7 many by signing the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Bill, and reopening water sites to public entry, which under-
8 mined his Progressive credentials. They also led to big Republican losses in the mid-terms of 1910.
9 Among the measures passed during Wilson’s administration were the 1913 Underwood-Simmons Tariff
40 Act, which actually, and unusually, cut duties, the creation of a more flexible currency, as well as the creation
1 of 12 Federal Reserve Banks, the Federal Trade Commission Act, which established a commission to regu-
2 late and investigate business practices, and the 1914 Clayton Act against price discrimination that led to
3 monopoly. By the autumn of 1914 Wilson seemed to think the reforms of the ‘New Freedom’ were basic-
4 ally completed. Subsequently he did not support female suffrage, he condoned reimposition of segregation
45 in the agencies of the federal government in contrast to Roosevelt, and he refused further reforms as either
46 being unnecessary or unconstitutional. In the 1914 Congressional elections the Democrats suffered major
47 losses, and by the end of 1915 a second set of reforms was on its way. The fact that Wilson needed the
48 stimulus of electoral defeats to prompt him into further action raises a question mark about his progressive
49222 nature. He also seemed to lose interest in the Clayton Act and did little to protect it from conservative
attack. Neither did he really pursue monopolies with any great zest. Wilson’s repressive nature was revealed
during the First World War after his narrow re-election in 1916; and his refusal to help the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in its campaign against lynching also shows
him in a bad light, even though he did push through the first federal laws regarding workmen’s compen-
sation and child labour, an eight-hour day for railway workers, and he also encouraged female suffrage
campaigners.
On balance Roosevelt was probably the most progressive President of the three, and he stood out on
environmental issues. Taft sided with the conservatives ultimately, and Wilson’s failure to back certain
causes or to push for further reform until he realised votes were at stake, must go against him. However
Progressive the three Presidents were, they did not solve the problem of monopoly, reduce inequality,
remove ‘boss rule’ or political corruption, nor did they raise social welfare to European levels, and big
business would make a big comeback during the less idealistic 1920s.
PRACTICE ESSAY
11 (a) How far was President Wilson a reluctant Progressive? (30)

(b) ‘In practice more conservative than in theory.’ Discuss this view of Progressivism. (60)
(OCR)
Advice: For Part (a) a balanced answer is required that weighs up the evidence suggesting Wilson was whole-
heartedly committed to Progressive reform against his apparent waning enthusiasm for reform by the autumn
of 1914. For Part (b) a very good understanding of the issues linked to Progressivism is needed as well as a
grasp of the historiography. The motives of Progressives need to be understood, as well as the essential reluctance
of ‘Progressive Presidents’ to interfere with big business.
Part 3: Sources
1 Big business and Progressivism
■ Source A: F.B. Tracy, ‘Why the Farmers Revolted’, Forum 16 (October 1893), pp. 242–3
Nothing has done more to injure the [western] region than these freight rates . . . The extortionate char-
acter of the freight rates has been recognised by all parties . . . Another fact which has incited the farmer
against corporations is the bold and unblushing participation of the railways in politics. At every political
convention their emissaries are present with blandishments and passes and other practical arguments to
secure the nomination of their friends . . . By these means, the railroads have secured an iron grip upon
legislatures . . .
■ Source B: Robert La Follette, 1908
1898 was the beginning of great industrial organization . . . Within a period of three years following, 149
such reorganizations were effected with total stock and bond capitalization of $3,784,000,000 . . . The success
of these [re-]organizations led quickly on to a consolidation of combined industries, until a mere handful
of men controlled the industrial production of the country . . .
No student of the economic changes in recent years can escape the conclusion that the railroads, telegraphs,
shipping, cable, telephone, traction, express, mining, iron, steel, coal, oil, gas, electric light, cotton, copper,
SOURCES • 123
1111 sugar, tobacco, agricultural implements and the food products are completely controlled and mainly
2111 owned by these hundred men . . . With this enormous concentration of business it is possible to create,
3 artificially, periods of prosperity and periods of panic. Prices can be lowered or advanced at the will of the
4111 ‘System’.
5
6 ■ Source C: Theodore Roosevelt
7
8 The effort to restore competition as it was sixty years ago, and to trust for justice solely to this proposed
9 restoration of competition, is just as foolish as if we should go back to the flintlocks of Washington’s conti-
10111 nentals as a substitute for modern weapons of precision . . . Our purpose should be, not to strangle business
1 as an incident of strangling combinations, but to regulate big corporations in a thoroughgoing and effec-
2 tive fashion, so as to help legitimate business as an incident to thoroughly and completely safeguarding the
3 interests of the people as a whole.
4
5 ■ Source D: Ruling of the Supreme Court on Eugene Debs and the Pullman Strike, David
6 Brewer, 1895
7
8 It is obvious that while it is not the province of the government to interfere in any mere matter of private
9 controversy between individuals, or to use its great powers to enforce the rights of one against another,
20111 yet, whenever the wrongs complained of are such as affect the public at large, and are in respect of matters
1 which by the Constitution are entrusted to the care of the nation, and concerning which the nation owes
2 the duty to all the citizens of securing to them their common rights, then the mere fact that the govern-
3 ment has no pecuniary interest in the controversy is not sufficient to exclude it from the courts or prevent
4
it from taking measures therein to fully discharge those constitutional duties.
5
6 The national government, given by the Constitution power to regulate interstate commerce, has by express
7 statute assumed jurisdiction over such commerce when carried upon railroads. It is charged, therefore, with
8 the duty of keeping those highways of interstate commerce free from obstruction, for it has always been
9 recognized as one of the powers and duties of a government to remove obstructions from the highways
30 under its control.
1
2
4
6
7 (a) Study Source C. From this Source and your own knowledge explain what Roosevelt means
8 when he says he wants to ‘regulate big business’. (20)
9 (b) Study Sources C and D. How far does the view of the Supreme Court in Source D support
40 Roosevelt’s views on the regulation of big business in Source C? (40)
1
2 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain how far
3 you agree that all branches of federal government were generally supportive of big
4 business in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. (60)
45
46 (a) Roosevelt means that he believes federal government should monitor and generally ‘keep an eye’ on
47 the practices of trusts and corporations, rather than simply allowing the ‘free market’ to operate. He sees
48 regulation as a way of making business fairer and ‘completely safeguarding the interests of the people as a
49222 whole’, without stifling business, which he broadly thinks is in everyone’s interest. He feels that regulation
is the way forward rather than attempting to turn back the clock and likens it to exchanging effective
modern weapons for the outdated ‘flintlocks of Washington’s continentals.’
(b) The Supreme Court verdict in Source C supports Roosevelt’s views that big business should be regu-
lated rather than ‘strangled’ in the sense that it does not believe the government should ‘interfere in any
mere controversy between individuals’, and also asserts that ‘whenever the wrongs complained of . . . affect
the public at large’ the government effectively has a duty to act in the public interest even though there
may be no financial advantage to be gained by the government. It upholds the government’s right to ‘regu-
late interstate commerce’, but goes further than Roosevelt by also advocating the government’s right to act
against strikes (i.e. against the workers as well) if the interest of the public as a whole is threatened, as was
judged the case in the Pullman Strike.
(c) Theodore Roosevelt developed the reputation of being a ‘trust-buster’ but in reality his rhetoric often
spoke louder than his actions. In other words he tended only to prosecute big business when it seemed to
be acting in a detrimental way, creating monopolies, stifling competition, or acting against the general inter-
ests of society. He was certainly not against big business per se and emphasises in Source C how he does
not wish to ‘strangle business’, but to safeguard the interests of the people as a whole by preventing abuses
from taking place within the system.
Roosevelt’s predecessors in the White House had taken a much more non-interventionist line regarding
big business, but Roosevelt could see divisions emerging within society if government did not remedy prob-
lems, the rise of socialism being something that concerned him in particular. Source A provides evidence
of opposition from the farmers towards the railroads over such issues as the ‘extortionate character of the
freight rates’ and the ‘unblushing participation of the railways in politics’. Source B highlights progressive
concerns about the economic power concentrated with ‘a mere handful of men’. Roosevelt obviously shared
the same concerns when he prosecuted Morgan’s great Northern Securities holding company. The fact that
Roosevelt was behaving differently from his predecessors is illustrated by Morgan’s shock that the President
had not contacted him for a friendly chat ‘to sort things out’ prior to prosecution.
If anything, the Supreme Court was more conservative than even the Presidents in protecting the rights
of big business. Early prosecutions using the Sherman Anti-Trust Act and the Interstate Commerce Act
were thrown out by the Supreme Court, but Roosevelt’s resurrection of the Sherman Act proved successful,
with 44 corporations prosecuted. It is worth noting however that more trusts were set up during Roosevelt’s
time in office than had been under McKinley who was regarded as something of a ‘corporate lapdog’,
emphasising the point that even Roosevelt was broadly supportive of big business. The Supreme Court’s
decision in Source D to grant an injunction against the Pullman Strike demonstrates judicial determina-
tion not to allow the unions to hold the country to ransom or to obstruct ‘interstate commerce’, and this
tended to be supported by Presidential decisions to send in troops to put down such conflicts as the Great
Railroad Strike of 1877 and the Pullman Strike in 1894.
As far as Congress was concerned there was generally a sympathy with big business, with the election
of 1888 regarded as the most corrupt in American history. The Republicans effectively outbid the Democrats
to win control of both Houses of the ‘Billion Dollar Congress’; the passage of the McKinley Tariff Act,
which raised duties to an extremely high level as well as extending the number of products covered, was
regarded as a payback for the industrialists who had bankrolled the party. It was little wonder, then, that
anti-business laws were few and far between.
Broadly speaking all branches of federal government were generally supportive of big business in the
late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, although their consciences had been stirred during the 1890s,
and Progressive reforms over the next 20 years or so alleviated some of the worst problems big business
brought with it. Even so, the odds remained heavily stacked in favour of business and heavily stacked against
the workers.
SOURCES • 125
1111 ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE

2111
3 (a) Study Source D. Explain the term ‘interstate commerce’ as used in Source D. (20)
4111 (b) Study Sources A and B. How far does Source A support the fears expressed about big
5 business in Source B? (40)
6
7 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain the extent
8 to which big business threatened liberty and democratic institutions in the US in the late
9 nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. (60)
10111
1
2
3 2 Immigration
4
5 ■ Source A: Francis A. Walker, ‘Restriction of Immigration’, Atlantic Monthly June, vol . 77,
6 no. 464 (1896), pp. 822–3
7
8 The question today is, not of preventing the wards of our almshouses, our insane asylums, and our jails
9 from being stuffed to repletion by new arrivals from Europe; but of protecting the American rate of wages,
20111 the American standard of living, and the quality of American citizenship from degradation through the
1 . . . peasants from the countries of eastern and southern Europe.
2
3 ■ Source B: John Mitchell, Immigration and the Living Wage (1913)
4
5 Formerly, the great majority of immigrants came from England, Ireland, Germany, and the Scandinavian
6 countries, from countries, in other words, where conditions of life and labour were, to some extent, com-
7 parable to those of the United States. At the present time, the source of immigration shifted from northern
8
and western to eastern and southern Europe, and from men with a higher to men with a lower standard
9
of living. The illiteracy of the immigrant has become more pronounced. This illiteracy, amounting in some
30
cases to sixty-five to seventy-five per cent, debars the newly arrived immigrant from many trades, makes
1
it more difficult for him to adapt himself to American conditions and American manners of thought,
2
and renders it almost inevitable that he fall into the hands of the sweater and exploiter. The practically un-
3
restricted immigration of the present day is an injustice both to the American workingman, whether native
4
or foreign-born, and to the newly landed immigrant himself. As a result of this practically unrestricted and
5
unregulated immigration, the congestion of our large cities is so intense as to create abnormally unhealthy
6
conditions. The average immigrant from eastern and southern Europe brings with him from eight to ten
7
8 dollars, which is about the railroad fare from New York to Pittsburgh and is hardly sufficient to support
9 him for two weeks. It is inevitable, also, that he remain where he lands and take the work offered him on
40 the spot.
1
2 ■ Source C: Dr Charles Benedict Davenport, Heredity in Relation to Eugenics (1911)
3
4 . . . the population of the United States will, on account of the great influx of blood from South-eastern
45 Europe, rapidly become darker in pigmentation, smaller in stature, more mercurial, more attached to music
46 and art, [and] more given to crimes of larceny, kidnapping, assault, murder, rape and sex-immorality . . .
47 [and] the ratio of insanity in the population will rapidly increase.
48
49222
■ Source D: President Cleveland objecting to the literacy clause of the proposed Immigration
Act (March 1897)
A radical departure from our national policy relating to immigrants is here presented. Heretofore we have
welcomed all who come to us from other lands except those whose moral condition or history threatened
danger to our national welfare and safety. We have encouraged those coming from foreign countries to
cast their lot with us and join in the development of our vast domain, securing in return a share in the
blessings of American citizenship.
A century’s stupendous growth, largely due to the assimilation and thrift of millions of sturdy and patriotic
adopted citizens attests the success of this generous and free-handed policy which, while guarding
the people’s interests, exacts from our immigrants only physical soundness and moral soundness and a
willingness and ability to work.
OCR QUESTION FORMAT
(a) Study Source B. From this Source and your own knowledge explain why immigrants from
‘eastern and southern Europe’ appear to be a problem. (20)
(b) Study Sources A and B. How far does Source A support the fears expressed in
Source B? (40)
immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries posed a serious problem
for the US federal government. (60)
(a) John Mitchell, leader of the mineworkers, initially suggests that the earlier immigrants came from
places such as England, Ireland, Germany and Scandinavia, ‘where conditions of life and labour were, to
some extent’ like those in the United States. The implication of this statement becomes apparent when he
goes on to discuss the poorer and less literate immigrants from eastern and southern Europe, who because
they are unable to read or write cannot do certain jobs, will find it ‘more difficult to adapt . . . to American
conditions and . . . manners’ and could well find themselves exploited. In other words the new immigrants
themselves will face problems. Mitchell however then goes on to point out the problem immigration poses
to workers already living in America as well as the new immigrants, by citing the overcrowding and ‘abnor-
mally unhealthy conditions’ in the cities. Finally he seems to come back to the new immigrants specifically,
worrying that most are so poor they will simply ending up taking the first jobs they can get. As a union
leader himself, Mitchell would also have been acutely aware of how difficult it was to organise workers
from a diversity of cultural backgrounds, and how the constant stream of immigration had a downward
effect on wages, with new arrivals being prepared to work for low wages and to break strikes.
Although Mitchell does refer to the poverty of the immigrants, their illiteracy, and difficulties fitting
in, there is certainly no overt reference to any sort of racial inferiority, or linking of immigrants to crime,
which was made by many at the time.
(b) In Source A, one suspects that Francis Walker, by drawing attention to the fact that he does not believe
the main question is to do with new immigrants becoming a welfare burden, is actually intending to draw
attention to exactly that issue. He does however go on to suggest that the real issue is ‘protecting the
American rate of wages . . . standard of living . . . and quality of American citizenship from degradation
through . . . peasants’ from eastern and southern Europe. He therefore does not support Mitchell to any
SOURCES • 127
1111 great extent, because Mitchell actually appears more genuinely concerned for the immigrants than people
2111 already living in America.
3 Walker is clearly most worried about the impact the immigrants will have on others, and whereas
4111 Walker suggests that poverty is not the main question, Mitchell obviously believes that the fact that ‘the
5 average immigrant brings . . . from eight to ten dollars’ is a problem. Terms Walker uses such as ‘degra-
6 dation’ regarding citizenship, and ‘peasants’, have overtones of racial superiority, which are not present in
7 Mitchell’s piece at all. Walker’s sentiment only really support Mitchell’s fears in the sense that he fears for
8 standards of living. Mitchell’s concerns about congestion in the cities is clearly linked to living standards.
9
10111 (c) Immigration posed a problem for federal government in many respects, and many related issues are
1 covered in the Sources. The sheer scale of immigration was a problem in itself with something like 26
2 million immigrants arriving between 1865 and 1915, mainly crowding into cities that were already strug-
3 gling to cope with the problems of industrialisation and urbanisation. John Mitchell in Source B highlights
4 the ‘congestion’ in the cities and ‘abnormally unhealthy conditions’. These problems of squalor in living
5 and working conditions were undoubtedly a result of the pace of industrialisation but immigration made
6 the situation worse, and hastened the Progressive reforms of the early nineteenth century. Some of the
7 worst working conditions tended to be in occupations where immigrants formed the bulk of the workforce
8 such as in the Colorado coalfields and urban garment factories.
9 One of the main problems faced by government was nativist and racist sentiment felt towards immi-
20111 grants by those Americans who had lived in the US for a longer period. Francis Walker in Source A alludes
1 to this with his talk of ‘degradation’ of citizenship, while in Source C Davenport uses racially-charged
2 language to suggest that new immigrants will bring with them a tendency to ‘larceny, kidnapping, assault,
3 murder, rape and sex-immorality’ as well increasing ‘insanity in the population’. He also refers specifically
4 to a rapid change in skin pigment of the people. Incidents such as the Haymarket Bomb, which was linked
5 to German anarchists, did give the government cause for concern, as did rising crime rates in the cities in
6 areas of immigrant population, but as stated above, these could be regarded as problems linked to indus-
7 trialisation rather than immigration specifically. However the government did bow to nativist pressure at
8 times, passing such measures as the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, and setting up commissions in response
9 to groups such as the Immigration Restriction League, but Presidents Cleveland, Taft and Wilson all vetoed
30 literacy tests for new arrivals.
1 In other respects the federal government recognised the benefits that immigrants brought. Cleveland
2 in Source D clearly felt that American prosperity had been largely based on the ‘assimilation and thrift of
3 millions’ of immigrants, and although men like John Mitchell might have concerns about immigrants
4 holding back the labour movement and keeping down wages, federal government would have had no such
5 qualms. The fact that huge numbers continued to pour in, despite various Immigration Acts putting slight
6 restrictions on those arriving during the period, suggests that the federal government did not really view
7 immigration as a serious problem, and in many ways regarded it as a great benefit.
8
9
40
1 (a) Study Source A. From this Source and your own knowledge explain why Walker in
2 Source A feared that immigrants would endanger American wages, the standard of
3 living and quality of citizenship. (20)
4
(b) Study Sources C and D. How far does Source D contradict the views expressed in
45
Source C? (40)
46
47 (c) Study all the Sources. Using all these Sources and your own knowledge explain
48 how far supporters of immigration restriction were motivated by nativist and racist
49222 sentiment. (60)
1 Robber barons or captains of industry?
Using the Spartacus Educational website and any other sources you wish, one half of the group puts together
evidence that businessmen in late nineteenth-century America were ‘robber barons’ who feathered their
own nests using unscrupulous methods, while the other half looks for evidence that they deserved the title
‘captains of industry’ for their enterprise and the benefits they brought to the country. Some of the men
worthy of investigation include: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, William Vanderbilt, J.P. Morgan, John D.
Rockefeller and William Tweed.
2 The themes of Progressive legislation
When writing an essay a straight chronological approach to events rarely works, and it is often far more
effective to adopt a thematic approach. Using the chronology at the start of this chapter, and taking the
Progressive laws from 1890 onwards, try to construct a series of themes or categories under which all the
reforms could be organised. This could be displayed as a spider diagram using different colours for different
types of legislation.
Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, McGraw-Hill Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University
(2000). Press (1983/1995).
Vincent P. De Santis, The Shaping of Modern America John M. Murrin, Paul E. Johnson, James M. McPherson
1977–1920, Harlan Davidson (2000). et al., Liberty Equality Power, Harcourt (2001).
Charles W. Eagles, America, A Narrative History, Norton Celia O’Leary, ‘Americans All: Reforging a National
(1999). Brotherhood, 1876–1917’, History Today, October
Alan Farmer, Reconstruction and the Results of the Amer- (1994).
ican Civil War 1865–1877, Hodder & Stoughton David Paterson, Susan Willoughby, Doug Willoughby,
(1997). Civil Rights in the USA 1863–1980, Heinemann
Alan Farmer and Vivienne Sanders, American History, (2001).
1860–1990, Hodder & Stoughton (2002). Hugh Tulloch, The Debate on the American Civil War Era,
Eric Foner, Reconstruction – America’s Unfinished Revolu- Manchester University Press (1999).
tion 1863–1877, Harper & Row (1984). Margaret Walsh, ‘New Horizons for the American West’,
Glenda Gilmore (ed.), Who Were the Progressives?, Bedford History Today, March (1994).
(2002). Margaret Walsh, ‘Frederick Jackson Turner and the
Milton Goldin, ‘The Gospel of Andrew Carnegie’, History American Frontier’ (n.d.).
Today, June (1988). Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
Lewis L. Gould, America in the Progressive Era 1890–1914, Longman (1996).
Longman (2001).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 6
5
6
7
8
9 Boom and Bust: Economy and
10111
1
2
Society, 1919–1933
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111
1
2 This chapter will assess the impact of the Bolshevik Revolution on the US and the economic,
3
social and political development of the nation through the ‘boom and bust’ years of the
4
5 1920s.
6
7
8 Historical background Prohibition
9 Causes of the Depression
30 Introduction
1 The ‘Red Scare’ of 1919
2 Sacco and Vanzetti Sources
3 The Ku Klux Klan
4 The ‘Monkey Trial’ 1 Society in the 1920s
5 Immigration 2 Boom and bust
6 Prohibition and organised crime
7 Politics in the 1920s
8 The boom of the 1920s Historical skills
9 The ‘crash’ and causes of the
40 Great Depression 1 Report on immigration
1 The Depression and attempts to deal 2 Were Sacco and Vanzetti guilty?
2 with it
3
4
45 Essays
46
47 The boom
48 Xenophobia and racism
49222
130 • BOOM AND BUST: ECONOMY AND SOCIETY, 1919–1933
Chronology
1919 18th Amendment ratified (Prohibition)

Police strike in Boston
Race riots in Chicago and other cities
Steel strike
Volstead Act over Wilson’s veto enforcing 18th Amendment
1920 19th Amendment ratified (Female suffrage)
Palmer Raids and the ‘Red Scare’
Sacco and Vanzetti convicted of murder
Harding elected President
1921 Emergency Quota (Immigration Restriction) Act
1922 Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act
1923 Harding died in office – Calvin Coolidge became President
1924 Coolidge elected President in own right
Immigration Restriction Act
1925 Scopes Trial
1926 Revenue Act cut taxes
1927 Sacco and Vanzetti executed
1928 Herbert Hoover elected President
1929 Wall Street crash on ‘Black Tuesday’
Agricultural Marketing Act
1930 Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act
Drought began in Dust Bowl
1931 Reconstruction Finance Corporation established
Bonus Army marched on Washington
1932 Franklin D. Roosevelt elected President
Introduction
Despite America’s late entry to the First World War, it lost 112,000 men, and although this number was
relatively low compared with those of other countries involved it had a huge psychological effect on the
country, and seemed to confirm to many that America should have remained neutral. The war had also
brought about restrictions of American liberties, with the Espionage Act of 1917 and Sedition Act of 1918
basically stopping public criticism of government. Washington had also stirred up anti-German feeling to
dangerous levels, and with it came a patriotism that had further implications for free speech. There can be
little doubt that some of the less pleasant trends of the 1920s, such as xenophobia, emphasis on ‘100 per
cent Americanism’, and an almost paranoid fear of left-wing ideas were partly a result of the war and the
feelings it engendered. Race riots also increased between 1917 and 1919, partly as a result of hundreds of
thousands of blacks moving to Northern cities during the war, and, as unemployment increased after the
war, tensions between whites and blacks and immigrants simmered.
Contemporaries liked to refer to the 1920s as ‘the New Era’, an age in which the US was becoming a
modern nation. To a large extent this was true, but as well as being a decade of materialistic gain, it was
also a period of disillusion, intolerance and inequality.
1111
2111 The ‘Red Scare’ of 1919
3
4111 During the war there was much hostility shown towards the German-Americans, and with the Bolshevik
5 Revolution of 1917, a xenophobic mood was set for the immediate post-war years. There was great suspi-
6 cion of the motives of American communists and socialists, many of whom were foreign-born, and when
7 in 1919 industrial unrest (which included a police strike in Boston and a walkout of 100,000 workers in
8 Seattle for five days) tainted by violence broke out across the country fears multiplied. In April, a number
9 of bombs in the mail of prominent capitalists such as J.D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan Jr and senior govern-
10111 ment officials were discovered. In June bombs exploded in eight cities, including one outside the home
1 of Attorney-General Mitchell Palmer – which gave him the perfect excuse to further his Presidential
2 ambitions by authorising a series of raids on left-wing groups. During the so-called ‘Palmer Raids’ in
3 December 1919 and January 1920 the Justice Department (depending on the historian and source) arrested
4 between 1,000 and 10,000 people who were held without trial, and uncovered the paltry sum of three pistols.
5 Over 500 radicals were deported to Russia, and in New York five elected members of the State Assembly
6 were disqualified from taking their seats because they were socialists. A number of explosions took place
7 soon after, including one at the House of Morgan Bank on Wall Street, which killed 30 people. In November
8 1920 one million people voted for Eugene Debs’ Socialist Party. Also in 1920 Andrea Salsedo, an anarchist,
9 was arrested, held for eight weeks, and not permitted contact with his family or a lawyer. His body was
20111 subsequently found 14 floors below where he had been held by the FBI. The verdict was suicide. Many of
1 his associates began to carry guns as result, including two men, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti.
2
3
4 Sacco and Vanzetti
5
6 During a raid in South Braintree, Massachusetts, a paymaster and factory guard were murdered and $15,000
7 stolen. Two Italian immigrants Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, anarchists and draft dodgers, were
8 arrested despite very little evidence against them. The trial judge made it fairly clear what he thought of
9 the two men and in July 1921 they were sentenced to death. Much debate over their guilt followed
30 during the subsequent years with many claiming the trial had been a travesty, until in August 1927, amid
1 international outcry, they were both electrocuted.
2
3
4 The Ku Klux Klan
5
6 The mood of post-war America was also reflected in the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), as ‘Wasp’
7 (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant) small-town mentality attempted to reassert itself. The Chicago race riots
8 of July 1919, which left 23 blacks and 15 whites dead and 537 people wounded, had been sparked off by a
9 black teenager drifting towards a ‘whites only’ beach on Lake Michigan. Similar but smaller riots broke out
40 in at least 20 other cities and rural towns. What made these riots different from previous episodes of large-
1 scale rioting, such as the Atlanta riot of 1906 and the Springfield riot of 1908, was that blacks fought back
2 and whites were killed and injured in significant numbers. It was in this sort of atmosphere that the new
3 Klan began to thrive. Founded in 1915 in Georgia by William Simmons, who was inspired by D.W. Griffith’s
4 heroic portrayal of the earlier Klan in the film ‘Birth of a Nation’, the new Klan was not so much directed
45 at blacks but Catholics, Jews and foreigners in general. It also tended to be anti-‘immoral’ values such as
46 drinking alcohol, sexual promiscuity and dancing. Membership increased dramatically following the
47 appointment of two full-time recruitment officers in 1920, and by 1925 had soared to between two and
48 five million (depending on the historian), having rapidly outgrown its Southern origins and expanded to
49222 Northern cities. In areas such as Oklahoma and Oregon, the KKK infiltrated state assemblies; Hugo Black,
Figure 6.1 Ku Klux Klan, c.1920 later a Supreme Court justice, had been a Klan member, as was
a governor of Alabama. It is estimated that in the early 1920s
Klan support helped to elect 16 US senators, and in 1924 the
Klan claimed to control 24 of the country’s 48 state legislatures.
It also managed to block the nomination of Al Smith at the
Democratic Convention essentially because he was a Catholic.
Those welcomed as members had to be white, native-born
men with essentially Christian views. Typically, they were lower
middle-class clerical workers, small businessmen and blue-
collar workers, although they did represent a cross-section of
communities. The Klan’s tendency to simply be against things
rather than putting forward a more positive set of policies or
ideas restricted its growth. From 1925 it faced increasing crit-
icism in the press and membership plummeted. In 1925 David
Stephenson, Grand Dragon of the Indiana Klan, was found
guilty of rape and murder in the second degree having kid-
napped a secretary who subsequently committed suicide. He
revealed details of corruption at high levels in the organisation
which caused further damage, while the attempts of Imperial
Wizard Hiram Wesley Evans to turn the Klan into a sort of
social club further undermined its standing. Government acts to restrict immigration removed one of the
Klan’s main grievances and the onset of the Depression tended to reduce tensions between different groups
in society. By 1930 it is estimated that the Klan had only about 45,000 members.
The ‘Monkey Trial’
In Dayton, Tennessee, in the summer of 1925, John Thomas Scopes, a 24-year-old teacher, was tried for
violating the state’s anti-evolution law. The American Civil Liberties Union had offered free legal counsel
to any Tennessee teacher who was willing to defy the law so that a test case could be brought. Many
Figure 6.2 Jury of the

Scopes ‘Monkey Trial’
1111 Americans were fundamentalist Protestants who regarded the creation of the world in seven days by God
2111 set down in the Bible as literally true, and rejected the Darwinian theory of evolution. In 1925 Tennessee
3 had banned any teaching which contradicted the Bible. William Jennings Bryan led the prosecution of
4111 Scopes, who was found guilty and fined, although Bryan’s reputation was damaged by the brilliant defence
5 mounted by Clarence Darrow, and he died of a heart condition and exhaustion days after the trial. The
6 trial received national coverage and the cause of fundamentalism was damaged greatly by the trial. Scopes
7 went back to teaching evolution without hindrance.
8
9
10111 Immigration
1
2 The First World War had engendered anti-German and anti-Austrian feeling and the Russian Revolution
3 of 1917 had caused increased suspicion of foreigners. The atmosphere of the ‘Red Scare’ and recession of
4 1920–1 also created antipathy towards immigrants, particularly those coming from Asia. Nativists argued
5 that the 1917 literacy test had failed to protect the US and new measures were called for, particularly by
6 ‘Waspish’ rural and small-town communities. Politicians and journalists warned of national decline and
7 racial degeneration as ‘new immigrants’ flooded unchecked into the country.
8 In 1921 the Emergency Quota Act limited the number of immmigrants to 357,000 per year, and set
9 quotas for national groups at 3 per cent of the number of the residents from those countries living in the
20111 US in 1910. The year 1910 was chosen in order to limit the number of ‘new immigrants’, although excep-
1 tions were made for artists, actors, singers, lecturers, nurses and other professionals. Essentially there was
2 an attempt to keep out the unskilled. Immigrants from French Canada and Latin America continued to
3 enter in great numbers. The National Origins Act (Johnson-Reid Act) of 1924 reduced the number of immi-
4 grants to 165,000 per year, and cut national quotas. Eastern European quotas were lowered to 2 per cent
5 of the 1890 figure (affecting those from southern and eastern Europe), Asians were excluded completely,
6 greatly offending the existing Chinese and Japanese communities. Mexicans were not included as they
7 provided a vital labour source for California. The Act came into permanent force in 1929 and set a limit
8 of 150,000 with each nationality set a figure based on its population of 1920. In reality about 85 per cent
9 of the quota was allocated to countries from northern and western Europe. The legislation of the 1920s
30 thereby marked a significant break with past attitudes towards immigration.
1
2
3 Prohibition and organised crime
4
5 About half of the states were actually ‘dry’ by 1917, and it is possible to see temperance campaigners as a
6 part of a wider movement that included anti-evolutionists and those who disapproved of relaxed sexual
7 morality. Once America had declared war on Germany, pressure for a national ban on the production and
8 consumption of alcohol grew. In particular the largely Protestant middle-class Anti-Saloon League was crit-
9 ical of morality in the big cities. Its members argued that it was morally wrong to drink while men died
40 in Europe, as well as it being against the will of God. On practical grounds it was important for the country
1 to conserve important grains such as barley, while it could be argued that the efficiency of workers and the
2 armed forces would also be improved. Social workers had major worries about the effects of alcoholism,
3 while others saw Prohibition as a way of getting at brewers of German origin.
4 Given that the liquor industry was the seventh largest in the country and also that Prohibition marked
45 a very far-reaching restriction of personal freedom it still seems amazing that Prohibition was ever passed.
46 The issue was to split the Democrats into the ‘drys’ from the rural South and West, and the ‘wets’ in the
47 urban North and East, but in January 1920 the 18th Amendment came into effect. Despite the hundreds
48 of thousands prosecuted for alcohol-related offences, Prohibition proved to be extremely difficult to enforce
49222 effectively given the money available. The geographical area of the US, its long borders with Canada and
Mexico, and 29,000 kilometres of coastline, all of which had to be policed, added to the problems. There
were only 1,500 government agents employed to deal with Prohibition, some of whom would have been
susceptible to bribery. The ban was unpopular with the richest in society who resented the impingement
on their freedom, and working-class immigrants tended to be another group particularly opposed. Even
President Harding had alcoholic drinks delivered to the White House.
One of the unforeseen consequences of Prohibition was the rise of organised crime. The high partic-
ipation of Italians, Irish and Jews in bootlegging and gangster activity reinforced the view that anyone from
those ethnic backgrounds was a threat to law and morality. Chicago was the ideal place for the distribu-
tion of alcohol as it was near the Canadian border and had very good road and rail links. Al Capone became
the chief racketeer there, employing 1,000 men to protect his trafficking of alcohol. By 1927 his annual
income was estimated at $60,000 million. Hundreds of gang murders took place, but there were very few
convictions. Other sorts of crime increased as well. The St Valentine’s Day Massacre of 1929 was the most
notorious incident in all of the violence, but when Capone was eventually convicted in 1931 it was for
evasion of income tax. Nor did Prohibition actually reduce the amount of drinking in the country. By 1929
there were 32,000 speakeasies in New York, twice the number of saloons before Prohibition. By 1927 drink-
driving offences had risen by 467 per cent while deaths from alcoholism were up 600 per cent up on the
1920 figure. The Depression meant most people had little money to spend on liquor, and consumption
began to drop only when bad times came.
Politics in the 1920s
Democrat candidate James Cox of Ohio and his running mate Franklin Delano Roosevelt made member-
ship of the League of Nations their key issue in the election of 1920. The census of 1920 indicated that for
the first time more people lived in urban areas than elsewhere, and this election was the first time that
women had voted on a national scale. The League was rejected by the Republicans and people generally at
that time seemed weary of idealism and reform, and more concerned about rising prices and strikes. Warren
Harding the Republican candidate, also from Ohio, was strengthened by his running mate Calvin Coolidge
who had, as governor of Massachusetts, helped to stop the strike by Boston police. The Republicans favoured
higher tariffs, low taxes, the restriction of immigration and aid to farmers, but Harding was kept away from
speech making as far as possible during the campaign. He did however manage to coin the slogan ‘Let us
return to normalcy’, and, whatever it meant, it seemed to suit the mood of the country. His victory was
by a greater margin than any previous candidate had achieved and it marked a move away from
Progressivism back to laissez-faire. The Republicans would retain control of the executive and generally
Congress as well until 1933 when Roosevelt himself became President.
Over the years, Harding has been the butt of much criticism from historians, who have picked on his
intellectual shallowness on major issues and his parochial view of politics and contrasted it with the high-
mindedness of Wilson, but he was far from being a reactionary bigot. Nonetheless, he certainly made some
poor choices of men to serve in his cabinet, bringing to Washington a number of friends from his home
state, hence their nickname ‘the Ohio Gang’. As well as giving some of them cabinet office, he also socialised
with them. Several of ‘the Ohio Gang’ became implicated in financial scandals, including Albert Fall, the
first US cabinet member to be convicted on a criminal charge, and sent to jail for accepting bribes in office.
Harding did, however, make some very good appointments to his cabinet such as Mellon, Hughes, Wallace
and Hoover. He also commuted the prison sentence of socialist leader Eugene V. Debs, supported calls for
an eight-hour day in the steel industry, vetoed a soldiers’ bonus bill in 1922, and supported arms limita-
tion at the Washington Conference on Naval Disarmament (also in 1922). There is little evidence to suggest
that he was implicated in the underhand activities of the ‘Ohio Gang’ but the worry its members caused
him probably contributed to his death from a coronary thrombosis in August 1923. His successor
1111 Calvin Coolidge was a man of impeccable moral standards, and this limited the damage done to the
2111 Republicans by Harding’s Presidency.
3 In January 1924 Coolidge made a speech saying ‘the chief business of the American people is busi-
4111 ness’. He believed in minimal government and was keen to balance the budget, cut taxes and ensure credit
5 was available. These ideas seemed to appeal to the nation, although a new Progressive Party emerged with
6 Robert La Follette as its candidate, standing on a platform that opposed monopolies. and supported tariff
7 reduction and government control of the railways. It polled 4.8 million votes.
8 In February 1925 the Revenue Act cut the maximum surtax (tax on the rich) payable from 40 per cent
9 to 20 per cent and led to spending and investment. Historians have traditionally picked up on these sorts
10111 of policies and Coolidge’s narrow approach, but in 1998 Robert Ferrell (The Presidency of Calvin Coolidge)
1 described Coolidge as idealistic and hard working with a strong sense of public service; and it should be
2 remembered that, in his speech of 1924, he argued for more schools and the growth of liberties. He was
3 comfortably re-elected in his own right in 1924, although, given certain health concerns, he chose not to
4 stand again. When ‘Silent Cal’ died in 1933, Dorothy Parker quipped ‘How can they tell?’.
5 Hoover was chosen as the Republican candidate in 1928, and based his campaign on continuing
6 Coolidge’s policies, proposing more tax cuts, continuing with tariff protection, and maintaining Prohibition,
7 although he was regarded as the more progressive member of the Harding/Coolidge administrations. The
8 Democrats were split over issues such as Prohibition and immigration. Al Smith was chosen as their candi-
9 date. He was a Catholic from New York and anti-Prohibition, but a ‘human progressive’ according to
20111 Traynor (2001). He polled 15 million votes, almost double Davis’s 8 million in 1924 and beat Hoover in
1 the 12 biggest cities of the country (cities which the Republicans had won in 1924), but Hoover won
2 comfortably overall. He promised ‘a chicken in every pot and two cars in every garage’, words that would
3 return to haunt him.
4
5
6 The boom of the 1920s
7
8 The basis of the boom in the 1920s had been laid in earlier times. The sheer size of the population gave
9 the US vast numbers of workers as well as potential consumers. The transcontinental railroads had created
30 a good transport infrastructure, and raw materials such as coal and oil were in plentiful supply. The
1 prevailing work ethic and belief in rugged individualism fostered an entrepreneurial spirit that bordered
2 on the religious. Had Calvin Coolidge not once said that ‘The man who builds a factory builds a temple’?
3 Large corporations in the meantime brought economies of scale, better integration and increased stability
4 to business.
5 War had given many businesses the opportunity to supply food and munitions, and to enter new
6 export markets that had hitherto been supplied mainly by Germany and Britain, as well as bankrupting
7 rivals. Banks also profited from loans to the Allies at the end of the war in Europe, and following a brief
8 recession in 1921–2 Harding’s appointment of Andrew Mellon to the Treasury and various other govern-
9 ment measures, the economy began to prosper, with more jobs becoming available and the standard of
40 living improving for most. Industrial output increased by over a third with new production methods and
1 types of management, and by 1929, the year of the Wall Street crash, the US made about 46 per cent of
2 the world’s industrial goods. Buying on credit or hire purchase (in 1921 the credit extended by the US
3 Federal Reserve Bank was $45.3 billion, by 1929 $73 billion), or paying by instalment, combined with low
4 taxation allowed many more people to purchase the consumer goods being churned out by improved busi-
45 ness methods and new industries. Alfred Sloan, who later became President of General Motors, set up the
46 first consumer credit agency in 1919. During the boom between 1922 and 1929 gross national product rose
47 from $74 billion to $104 billion, output increased by about 40 per cent, while income per head per year
48 grew from $672 to $857. New advertising methods, especially on the radio, proved to be very effective. In
49222 1920, people owned 60,000 radios in the US; by 1929 this figure was 10 million. There was also a huge
growth in department stores from 312 in 1920 to 1,395 by 1929, and chain stores also appeared. Standard
clothing sizes had been introduced during the war for the production of military uniforms, and led to mass-
produced ready-to-wear clothing in the shops in the 1920s. The emergence of the first mass consumer
society was taking place.
Three new industries led the boom: electricity, motor vehicles and related goods, and chemicals. In
1914, 30 per cent of US factories were powered by electricity but by 1929 this had risen to 70 per cent.
Electricity began to be used to power homes, making possible the use of new time-saving devices such as
cookers, vacuum cleaners, washing machines and refrigerators, which stimulated production further. In
1921 there were 5,000 refrigerators a year produced, but by 1930 there were one million. In 1920, the first
radio broadcasting station, KDKA, was set up.
Between 1909 and 1928, 15 million (a million a year produced in the 1920s) Model T cars were
produced from Henry Ford’s ‘moving assembly line’ (introduced in 1913, it cut the time to make a car
from 12.5 hours to 1.5 hours and had done away with the idea of labourers building the whole car). For
the first time cars came within the price range of ordinary workers, it being possible to buy a Model T for
less than 3 months’ wages for the average worker by 1925. Tasks in the factories however became duller
and more repetitive for workers and discipline was tightened as competition increased and targets had to
be reached. Labour turnover was high, which is why Ford doubled pay, cut the working day to eight hours
and introduced profit-sharing. The factory completed at River Rouge, Michigan, employed about 80,000
workers (many of whom were taken on in the spring and laid off in the autumn each year) and was the
biggest factory complex in the world. Ford’s Protection Department employed security men who intimi-
dated and assaulted union organisers, and it was not until 1941 that Ford officially recognised any labour
union representing the employees in pay bargaining. These sorts of attitude were not uncommon among
employers and tended to be supported by the courts. ‘Yellow dog’ contracts by which workers pledged not
to strike were also backed by legal judgements. ‘Welfare capitalism’, such as Ford espoused, only helped a
relatively small number of workers, and most workers got wage increases proportionately lower than the
rate of growth of the economy. The employers’ campaign for the ‘open shop’ was in reality an attempt to
weaken the power of the bigger unions.
The motor industry in turn stimulated demand for other products, and by the mid-1920s was using
96 per cent of the nation’s oil, 75 per cent of its plate glass, 65 per cent of its leather, 80 per cent of its
rubber and 20 per cent of its steel. John Traynor (2001) says that the increase in road building (for which
the government took responsibility, building an average of 10,000 miles of road per year in the 1920s), the
movement to the cities, growth of the suburbs, and the building of skyscrapers can all be linked to changes
Ford had brought.
Presidents Harding, Coolidge and Hoover were happy to take much of the credit for the boom in pros-
perity until the crash of October 1929. The Republican Party’s attitude towards business certainly
encouraged investment, stimulated production and contributed to consumer confidence, while technolog-
ical innovation and the scientific management methods of experts such as Frederick Taylor contributed to
high levels of production. Between 1921 and 1933 the Treasury and the Departments of Agriculture and
Commerce were staffed by very capable men. Andrew Mellon, the second richest man in the country, served
at the Treasury in the 1920s, supporting high tariffs, low taxes and big business in general. The high tariffs
of the Fordney-McCumber Act of 1922 brought money to the government, which allowed it to regularly
reduce taxes, and thereby stimulate consumer purchasing in the 1920s. As Secretary of Commerce, Herbert
Hoover helped to modernise industry and extended the role of his department.
Despite the appearance of general prosperity and the rise in average wages during the 1920s, the US
remained a country of extremes. Prohibition remained a divisive issue, racism continued, and crime became
organised and more violent. American confidence was, however, reflected in other areas. The arts flour-
ished, with authors such as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald and poets such as Robert Frost and
T.S. Eliot emerging. Jazz made a significant impact, and in 1927 the first full-length talking picture, The
Jazz Singer, appeared. Aviation burgeoned, with Lindbergh’s flight across the Atlantic in 1927, and by 1930
1111 nearly half a million passengers and a growing proportion of mail were being carried by plane in the US.
2111 By 1929 there were also over 400 skyscrapers (buildings over 20 storeys high) in the country, and in 1931
3 the Empire State Building became the tallest building in the world, providing office space for 25,000 people.
4111
5
6 The ‘crash’ and causes of the Great Depression
7
8 The stock market crash of October 1929 and the Depression that followed have inspired a number of expla-
9 nations from economists and historians, but there can be little doubt that the economy had been
10111 fundamentally unsound. In 1963 Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz put forward the ‘monetary’ inter-
1 pretation of the Depression, i.e. that it was caused by the drastic contraction of the currency resulting from
2 bad decisions made by the Federal Reserve Board, which raised interest rates when it should have lowered
3 them. The ‘spending’ interpretation tends to be supported by Keynesian economists such as Peter Temin
4 who has argued that, although the contraction of the currency may have made the Depression worse, it
5 was a drop in investment and consumer spending which came first and helped to cause the contraction.
6 There does seem, however, to be a consensus of opinion that one of the key underlying causes of the
7 Depression was that too few people had shared in the prosperity of the period. The boom in business did
8 not bring higher living standards for all and certain industries such as textiles and coal mining actually
9 went into decline. The lack of employment law made it difficult for some workers to do anything to improve
20111 pay and conditions for themselves, and union membership fell from 5.1 million in 1921 to under 3 million
1 in 1929, by which time the wealthiest 5 per cent of American families received 30 per cent of the country’s
2 total family income, and the poorest 40 per cent of families got 12.5 per cent. Of families at the top end
3 of the scale, 0.1 per cent received an income equivalent to that of 42 per cent of families at the bottom.
4 The share of national income that went to the poorest 60 per cent fell by almost 13 per cent between 1918
5 and 1929, while the share that went to the wealthiest 20 per cent rose by over 10 per cent. Conditions as
6 well as pay also remained poor for many, with 25,000 workers killed a year in their jobs, and 100,000
7 permanently disabled in accidents at work during the 1920s.
8 Working-class women, African Americans, Native Americans, the elderly and the rural poor all
9 remained untouched by the rise in prosperity, as did the new unskilled immigrants in the big cities. The
30 number of women in work continued to increase but pay remained low and their jobs were usually menial.
1 Many blacks had moved North during the period 1916–20, attracted by higher wages in the armaments
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
40
1
2
3
4
45
46
47 Figure 6.3
48 Boom and bust
49222 cartoon
factories and driven away by harsh conditions in the South. In Northern cities, however, blacks tended to
fill unskilled low-paid jobs, live in slums areas and suffer hostility from whites. Native Americans had lost
their land and culture in the previous century, and many resided in poor conditions on reservations where
incidents of alcoholism, crime and infant death rate were all high. Particularly poor areas in the 1920s
included the textile towns of New England, the Appalachian region of West Virginia and Kentucky, and
the rural South in general.
It should be remembered that in the 1920s one-third of the workforce was still in agriculture, but per
capita farm income fell to one-third of the national average. Farmers had accumulated huge new debts
during the First World War as they tried to take advantage of wartime price rises, but in the 1920s these
debts became a crippling burden. Prices went down as demand from Europe fell while fertilisers and
machinery remained expensive. Increasing competition from Canada and Argentina did not help but over-
production was the main problem, with farmers increasingly having to sell food at less than it cost to
produce. In the South the boll weevil destroyed the cotton crop, the Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act of 1922
had the effect of closing many foreign markets to US farmers, and Prohibition cut the demand for grain
from brewers and distillers. In 1924 alone about 600,000 farmers lost their farms, and during the decade
as a whole about 13 million acres of cultivated land were abandoned. Farmers put pressure on politicians
and a series of Acts were passed between 1921 and 1927 to relieve some of the problems they faced. However,
in 1927–8 Coolidge gave a stark reminder of the Republican mindset by vetoing the McNary-Haugen Bill,
by which the government would have bought surplus produce at a guaranteed price to sell on the world
market, on the grounds that it would lead to overproduction and create a large bureaucracy of officials.
The crash of 1929 meant Americans were unable to pay the prices for food they had been doing, and with
the Depression hitting worldwide there was no market abroad. Dairy farmers and fruit and vegetable growers
profited as city markets had grown, but farming in general was in serious decline.
Industrial workers fared better than others in the 1920s, with hours falling, real wages going up by 26
per cent and unemployment going down to 4.2 per cent by 1928. Working conditions did improve and
‘company unions’ developed, though many employers remained hostile towards unions and it was not
unusual for strike-breakers to be brought in and for deaths to occur during industrial disputes. In 1922,
following the killing of two strikers by two guards at the Southern Illinois Coal Company, 19 strike-breakers
were killed, leading to public hostility towards the unions.
In 1929 it was reckoned that 12 million families were below the poverty line, and by 1930 this figure
had risen to 16 million families (about 70 million people). The maldistribution of income meant that by
1929 earlier rates of consumption could not be sustained. It is also worth noting that 70 per cent of divi-
dend income from shares went to the richest 1 per cent of the population.
Alan Brinkley (2000) has pointed to the lack of diversification in the economy in the 1920s as a major
problem, with prosperity effectively based on a limited number of industries such as cars (which employed
7 per cent of all manufacturing wage earners) and construction. When they went into decline so did the
economy as a whole. The year 1927 is now seen to be when problems began to manifest themselves, but
were ignored. Sales of cars fell, the rise in industrial wages slowed down and fewer new houses were built.
Feverish stock market speculation has often been regarded as a major cause of the crash, and in 1928
the Federal Reserve Board raised interest rates to try to limit the purchase of shares, and warned banks not
to lend money for speculation on the stock market. For a long time the explanation of the speculative
mania which seized people in 1928 and 1929 was that people were enticed to borrow and credit was easy
to obtain for the purchase of shares ‘on margin’, but this now seems far too simplistic and ignores the fact
that in times before and since the same preconditions have existed without there being a ruinous crash.
J.K. Galbraith has suggested that the hyper-confident mood of the people was what was important. Another
problem appears to have been that share prices continued to rise, regardless of the performance of the
companies, and this helped to maintain an illusion of prosperity.
Some say that the crash took money out of the system and led to the Depression, but Farmer and
Sanders have pointed out that the US actually survived the crash in many respects, and business activity
1111 did not begin to decline significantly until the middle of 1930. In fact, few Americans were directly affected
2111 by the crash. By April 1930 share prices had regained 20 per cent of the losses of the previous autumn, and
3 it was in 1931–2 that the really disastrous falls took place. Nevertheless it is the autumn of 1929 which
4111 gains most attention.
5 On 24 October 1929 (Black Thursday) 13 million shares were sold and prices plummeted. On 29
6 October (Black Tuesday) 16.5 million shares were sold. By November the price of shares had fallen by a
7 third. Most agree that speculation on the stock market had run out of control. The increase in share values
8 over the preceding years had made them more attractive to a wider public and by early 1929 at least one
9 million people (not a huge proportion of the population) held them, but the value of shares could not
10111 continue to grow. Many investors had bought shares ‘on margin’, i.e. borrowed money (up to 75 per cent),
1 which did not help stability, and when demand began to slow down there was a realisation that many shares
2 had been overvalued. As soon as doubt set in, people started to get rid of their shares. Between 1930 and
3 1933 depositors lost $2.5 billion in savings from banks that closed their doors or went bankrupt, which
4 partly contributed to the money supply contracting by about a third, and consequently affected purchasing.
5 The country’s banking structure was fundamentally unsound. David Kennedy has said: ‘American banks
6 were rotten even in good times.’ The US had over 30,000 independent banks, many of which were poorly
7 managed, with limited capital, overly-dependent on the local economy and susceptible to sudden with-
8 drawals by many people if there was a ‘run’. The Federal Reserve Board, which supervised the banking
9 system, had limited powers but even so did not do enough to help banks in difficulties and its failure to
20111 help prevent the New York City Bank from closing its doors in December 1930 is often seen as a key event.
1 Brinkley (2000) has also added that corporate structure was unsound as well as the banking system.
2 Another issue which must be considered when looking at the causes of the Depression is what was
3 happening outside the US. American loans had helped many countries in Europe during and after the war,
4 but high US tariffs made it difficult for those countries to sell their products in the US and therefore pay
5 back the loans. They also began to retaliate against high American tariffs, and overproduction worldwide
6 meant US markets began to diminish. In early 1931, when it looked as if the US might pull out of the
7 Depression, banking collapses in Germany and Austria (countries in which US banks held a large stake)
8 contributed to further decline, and following Britain’s decision to leave the gold standard in September
9 1931 over 500 US banks collapsed in a month.
30 Galbraith has suggested that there was a ‘poor state of economic intelligence’ (1975: pp. 199–200) in
1 the country with economists at the time ‘almost uniquely perverse’ (p. 200) in advising the need for balanced
2 budgets and fearing going off the gold standard and risking inflation. Hoover himself cut government
3 spending in 1931 as there was less tax being collected, and put up taxes in 1932 which made things worse.
4 He also decided not to leave the gold standard, and raised import duties to the highest levels in US history,
5 which simply led to retaliation by other countries.
6
7
8 The Depression and attempts to deal with it
9
40 The downward spiral of the economy continued for three years. Trade fell from $10 billion in 1929 to
1 $3 billion in 1932, and output fell by half. By the autumn of 1931 unemployment stood at 8 million, by
2 1932 it was at least 13 million (25 per cent of the workforce), with 1–2 million people travelling the country
3 looking for work (hobos). Industrial production was cut by half between 1929 and 1932, and real earnings
4 fell by a third between 1929 and 1933. Five thousand banks went out of business during 1929/30, and nine
45 million people lost all their savings. At the beginning of 1929 Ford employed 120,000 workers at his Detroit
46 factory, but by August 1931 it was only 37,000. The impact on nearly all classes and areas was equally bad,
47 although Robert McElvaine argues the majority of the rich were ‘quite comfortable’ over the period.
48 Thousands of farms were repossessed, wheat prices fell by nearly two-thirds in three years, as did cotton
49222 between 1929 and 1932, and from 1930 a large area of the Great Plains began to suffer from one of the
worst droughts in history, the ‘Dust Bowl’ region stretching from Texas north into the Dakotas. The fact
that there was no dole meant that millions became reliant on soup kitchens and private charities. The
suicide rate went up 14 per cent during 1929–32, and the number of marriages fell by 10 per cent. There
were 110 reported deaths from starvation during the Depression, but poor diet and malnutrition hastened
the deaths of many others, and infant mortality rose as well. In 1935 it was estimated that 20 million people
were not getting enough to eat. ‘Hooverville’ shanties of the unemployed on the edges of major towns and
cities became a feature a life in the 1930s.
Michael Bernstein, in 1987, suggested that the reason the Depression lasted for so long was that 1929
was too late for the motor and construction industries to help resolve it, and too soon for newly emerging
industries such as aviation, petrochemicals/plastics, aluminium and electrical to be able to help. Given this
analysis, one wonders what the government could have done, but Herbert Hoover has taken much criti-
cism for his role.
Hoover was ironically the most able of the three post-war Republican Presidents. He had been elected
President in 1928, and was in favour of minimal government intervention in the economy, tax cuts, balanced
budgets and low interest. He was highly regarded by many, having come from a poor background and risen
to millionaire status, which had shaped his belief in ‘rugged individualism’. Hoover’s initial response to
the fall in share prices was to hold meetings with the leaders of industry to convince them to continue with
investment and to maintain targets for production and wage levels. He also encouraged local officials to
spend more on public works. He had organised famine relief during the war and was a compassionate man,
but his political and economic beliefs favoured private initiatives and voluntary projects to get America
back on its feet rather than government intervention. In April 1929, he pressed Congress to help farmers,
which led to tariff protection and the setting up of a Federal Farm Board to provide financial help, but he
also took the view that the United States’ problems, to a large extent, lay with external factors such as over-
production, political unrest and financial crises. Having taken credit for the boom, he took criticism for
the crash and it eventually became unsafe for him to campaign on the streets, although levels of violence
during the Depression were remarkably low.
In November 1929 Hoover persuaded railroad directors to continue with building railways, and local
politicians to increase spending on public works – but it would never be enough. He did establish, in
October 1930, the Emergency Committee for Employment to coordinate voluntary relief agencies, and in
1931 he persuaded the largest bankers to set up the National Credit Corporation to lend money to smaller
banks to make loans to businesses. He also cut taxes. The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act of 1930, however,
accelerated decline abroad and at home, as other governments retaliated.
In December 1931 Hoover asked Congress to create an Emergency Reconstruction Finance Corporation
(RFC) to permit huge loans to insurance companies, railroads and banks to promote fresh investment that
might spark recovery. The organisation was headed by Charles Dawes, but many businesses were too scared
to borrow, so much of the money went to large businesses in an attempt to restore confidence, and to
those who promised to pay for themselves. The RFC never had enough money to make a real difference
and it did not even spend what it had.
Recent interpretations of Hoover have been less harsh than those of his contemporaries. Robert
McElvaine has used the term ‘progressive individualism’ rather than ‘rugged individualism’ as a more accu-
rate description of his beliefs, as Hoover opposed large concentrations of wealth and believed the poor and
needy should be cared for by their own communities; but even he concedes that Hoover’s response of
voluntary charity combined with local and state relief was totally inadequate and his attempt to pursue a
middle way between direct intervention and laissez-faire was ineffective. In 1952 Hoover’s memoirs blamed
the First World War as the primary cause of the Depression. He worked tirelessly and intervened more
than any of his predecessors, nearly doubling the federal public works expenditure in three years, and in
1932 taking the federal budget $2.7 billion into the red, the largest peacetime deficit in US history, thus
paving the way for the New Deal. It should be said that, at the time, the Democrats had little to offer as
an alternative.
ESSAYS • 141
1111 Early in 1932, with an election looming, Hoover intervened more decisively. Congress provided
2111 $2 billion to fund the RFC, and in February he signed the Glass-Steagall Act allocating $750 million of
3 government gold reserves for loans to private businesses. In July he also signed legislation authorising the
4111 RFC to give $2 billion to state and local governments for public works programmes, and to help people
5 who could not pay off their mortgages, but all these measures still failed to alleviate the problems. Hoover
6 needed state governments to keep up spending, farmers to cut production, employers not to lay off any
7 workers, reform and regulation of banks and economy, as well as financiers to invest money in private
8 enterprises and bankers to give consumers credit, but people had ‘lost confidence in their economy, in
9 themselves and in the ability of Republican politicians to lead them out of the Depression’ (2000: p. 90).
10111 In the late spring of 1932, 22,000 First World War veterans helped by communist activists marched
1 on Washington, demanding payment of a veterans’ bonus approved by Congress in 1924 but not sched-
2 uled to be paid until 1944. The Senate defeated the bill to pay them off and in July Hoover approved a
3 plan to evict the ‘Bonus Marchers’ who had stayed on in the Anacosta Flats area. Under the command of
4 General Douglas MacArthur (who greatly exceeded Hoover’s orders) and Colonel Dwight D. Eisenhower,
5 700 armed soldiers led by Major George Patton attacked, resulting in the deaths of two veterans and a baby,
6 and a thousand people injured by gas. This was the final blow for Hoover.
7 The Depression was more psychologically damaging for the US than for any other country because of
8 the relative prosperity of the 1920s, although the collapse was not as complete as in Germany. Galbraith
9 has pronounced that ‘the rejection of both fiscal [tax and expenditure] and monetary policy amounted
20111 precisely to a rejection of all affirmative government economic policy . . . a triumph of dogma over thought.
1 The consequences were profound’ (1975: p. 202).
2 Franklin D. Roosevelt’s campaign differed little from that of the Republicans and he did not outline
3 in detail what his New Deal meant, although he did call for an end to Prohibition. Following Hoover’s
4 ‘lame duck’ period in office until March, during which time the economy got worse, the 20th Amendment
5 was passed which cut the interval to two-and-a-half months between election and inauguration of a new
6 President.
7
8
9
Part 2: Essays
30
1
2 The boom
3
4 1 What were the causes of the economic boom during the 1920s and to what extent did all
5 Americans share in the prosperity of the 1920s? (45)
6 (OCR)
7
8 There were certain preconditions which allowed the United States to create an economic boom in the 1920s,
9 namely: a large population which provided both workers and consumers; an excellent transport infra-
40 structure based on a number of transcontinental railroads, to which the government added a further 100,000
1 miles of road in the 1920s; and plentiful supplies of raw materials such as coal and oil. American attitudes
2 favoured individualism and hard work and tended to work against the interests of unions, while govern-
3 ment remained sympathetic towards employers and allowed the growth of large corporations, bringing
4 economies of scale and greater integration. The importance of business to the US was summed up by
45 President Calvin Coolidge whose comments included ‘the chief business of the American people is busi-
46 ness’ and ‘the man who builds a factory builds a temple’. A number of other factors contributed to the
47 boom including: the war; new production methods and management techniques; the lead given by partic-
48 ular industries; the expansion of money available; the development of a mass consumer market; and
49222 Republican policies in government.
The First World War had stimulated the growth of businesses, particularly those involved in the supply
of food and munitions, while the weakened capacity of countries such as Britain and Germany to trade
had been exploited by the US, which was able to enter new export markets. At the end of the war, US
banks made profits from loans to Allied powers, and this also helped to create a platform for further growth.
Widespread consumer credit, such as that introduced in 1919 by Alfred Sloan, facilitated the boom in
spending and helped to create a mass consumer market, while rising wages among industrial workers and
low taxation helped to maintain it. New production methods, the development of the assembly line by men
such as Henry Ford, scientific management techniques influenced by men such as Frederick Taylor, and
improved marketing such as that of Chrysler, all contributed to the increase of industrial output by a third.
GNP rose from $74 billion in 1922 to $104 billion by 1929. The automobile industry in particular led
the way, and stimulated other industries, such as oil, rubber and glass to follow. John Traynor has said
that Henry Ford ‘probably did more than any other individual to transform America into a modern,
urban society’. The growth of other new industries such as chemicals, electricity (particularly regarding the
development of domestic appliances) and synthetic textiles also had a great impact.
The Republicans, who monopolised the Presidency for the 1920s as well as Congress for most of the
decade, encouraged investment and stimulated production. High tariffs such as those set by the Fordney-
McCumber Act helped protect domestic production from foreign competition as well as increasing the
money government had in its budget, which in turn meant that taxes could be lowered, thereby leading to
an increase in consumer spending. The government also took responsibility for the building of roads.
If any factors can be singled out as more important than others they are possibly innovation in produc-
tion methods and the expansion of credit on a mass scale, as the other factors had all been present well
before the 1920s in America.
Industrial workers broadly benefited from the prosperity of the 1920s, with a decline of working hours,
real wages going up by 26 per cent and unemployment declining to 4.2 per cent by 1928. Some businessmen
believed that higher wages would increase production, and more was done on safety and recreational
facilities. However, many groups did not share in the general prosperity and, during the decade, the top
5 per cent of American families received 30 per cent of total family income, while the poorest 40 per cent
had 12.5 per cent of national income.
Certain industries were hit worse than others. Textiles went into decline in parts of New England, as
did coal mining and farming more generally. Per capita farm income was only a third of the national
average in the 1920s, and measures such as the McFadden Banking Act of 1927 to improve the availability
of loans had little effect overall. Given that a third of the nation’s workforce was employed in agriculture
this had major implications. Parts of the Appalachians and regions of the Great Lakes lacked modern ameni-
ties and living conditions were barely at subsistence levels. Migrant farmworkers, particularly Mexican
immigrants in California, experienced extremely poor living conditions and low pay. The rural South, with
its 8.5 million tenant and sharecropper families (3 million of whom were African Americans), depending
on landlords for housing, tools, loans and land, remained very poor.
For women (particularly those from the working class) the quality of employment opportunities did
not improve, nor did pay. Work remained menial, and few worked in the professions except for teaching
and nursing. The number of electrical domestic goods on sale did take some of the drudgery out of house-
work, and the wider use of birth control cut the birth rate to 21.3 per cent in 1930 from 27.7 per cent in
1920. African Americans, in the years from 1916 onwards, moved to the North in greater numbers but
were limited to the low-paid, least-skilled occupations, and also suffered resentment from Northern whites.
Indians lived on reservations, where crime and alcoholism, high infant death rate and low life expectancy
were endemic.
By 1930 there were at least 16 million families, embracing about 70 million people, below the poverty
line. The richest 1 per cent of the population received 70 per cent of dividend income from shares,
and 25,000 people a year died in accidents at work. The share of national income that went to the poorest
60 per cent had fallen by almost 13 per cent between 1918 and 1929, which meant that most people were
ESSAYS • 143
1111 earning less proportionately by the end of the decade than they had at the start. It can be fairly confidently
2111 concluded that only a minority of Americans shared in the prosperity of the 1920s.
3
4111 2 Account for the popularity of the Republican Party in the 1920s. (45)
5 (OCR)
6
7
Essay plan
8
9 Introduction: Background-type introduction describing the election successes of Republican Presidents
10111 Harding, Coolidge and Hoover, and possibly including a brief comment that Republican policies
1 as well as factors over which they had limited control combined to help them dominate the
2 Presidency.
3
Para 1: Assessment of popularity of Republicans based on scale of election victories in terms of the popular
4
vote and electoral college numbers.
5
6 Para 2: Explain context of post-war United States – anti-foreign, inward-looking, intolerant and wanting
7 to move away from the government intervention that had marked the Progressive era.
8
Para 3: Assessment of how Republican policies seemed to suit the public mood.
9
20111 Para 4: Analysis of the success of Republican Presidents in office particularly the apparent economic pros-
1 perity.
2
Para 5: The 1924 election and the impact of a third candidate of significance which split the anti-
3
Republican vote.
4
5 Para 6: Examine what the Democrats had to offer during the 1920s and the candidates they put forward.
6 It may also be worth considering the argument that Roosevelt had little new to offer in 1932 other
7 than fresh faces in charge.
8
Conclusion: Decision on whether the Republicans’ popularity was essentially down to their own policies,
9
the mood of the country at the time or the weakness of the Democrats.
30
1
2
3 Xenophobia and racism
4
5 3 To what extent were Americans xenophobic, anti-left and generally intolerant in the ten
6 years after the First World War? (20)
7 (AQA)
8
9 In the First World War, 112,000 US troops died, although this is a relatively small number when compared
40 with the losses of countries in Europe. It nonetheless made a big psychological impact on Americans. Many
1 Americans had wanted neutrality, however government propaganda had stirred up anti-German feeling,
2 and jingoism. Government intervention had also limited free speech. The Russian Revolution of 1917, the
3 subsequent ‘Red Scare’ and rise of communist and socialist movements in the US (many of which were
4 led by foreign-born men), the industrial unrest of 1919 (which included a five-day general strike in Seattle),
45 and the Boston police strike, all raised fears of impending revolution and saw the growth of xenophobia
46 and anti-left feeling.
47 The attempted assassination of Attorney-General Mitchell Palmer prompted the Palmer Raids on left-
48 wing organisations, resulting in nearly 10,000 arrests, the discovery of only three pistols and over 500
49222 deportations to Russia. In addition the New York legislature excluded elected socialist members. A number
of explosions and bomb attacks, including one on Wall Street killing 30 people, seemed to confirm that
America had been right to take the threat from the left and foreigners seriously, as did the one million
votes cast for Debs’ Socialist Party in the 1920 elections. The conviction for murder of Italian-born anar-
chists Sacco and Vanzetti, based on extremely flimsy evidence and heavily influenced by a judge who made
no pretence to be neutral in the case, seemed to confirm the mood of the nation, although there were
plenty who protested in the strongest terms to try to save these two men.
As well as anti-foreign and anti-left feeling in the country, interracial tension peaked as well after the
war. Many blacks had moved to the North during the war in search of better jobs and greater tolerance, but
were not necessarily able to find either. There were 25 race riots in the last six months of 1919 alone, and
in Chicago 38 people were killed and over 500 injured, after a black teenager had inadvertently drifted
towards a ‘whites only’ beach on Lake Michigan. The resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan also peaked during
the years following the war, with its members taking an intolerant line on sexual morality, dancing and
drinking alcohol, as well as being against blacks, Jews, foreigners and Catholics. By 1925 membership had
risen above two million and included men from all social groups. The government, to a certain extent,
shared the fears of small-town America, and in the 1920s broke with the past by introducing a series of
Quota Acts to restrict the numbers of immigrants entering the country from southern and eastern Europe
and Asia. This legislation contributed in part to the rapid decline of the Klan in the second half of the decade.
The mood of intolerance was further reflected in the ‘Monkey Trial’ of 1925 in which the state of
Tennessee prosecuted a biology teacher who had taught students about Darwinian theories of evolution
rather than sticking to the biblical version of creation. Prohibition in itself, which provided a backdrop to
the decade, could be said to have been a further indicator of intolerance with its restriction of civil liber-
ties. Republican governments during the period were generally short on idealism, and although there was
a flourishing of the arts, particularly literature, as well as the development of greater rights for women and
the emergence of a confident and flamboyant culture in many respects, the ten years following the war
were years of unprecedented xenophobia and intolerance towards anything or anyone seeming less than
‘100 per cent American’.
4 Account for the popularity of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s. (20)
(AQA)
The post-war period in the US was characterised by intolerance, racial bigotry and suspicion of foreigners
and immigrants from certain countries. It was in this atmosphere that a revived Ku Klux Klan thrived for
a short period of time.
In 1915 William Simmons, inspired by the epic film ‘Birth of a Nation’, in which the original Klan
was portrayed in heroic and romantic terms, resurrected the organisation. At first the popularity of the
new Klan was low, but when professional promoters Elizabeth Tyler and Edward Clarke were employed to
boost recruitment, its popularity soared and spread from the South to the states of the mid-west. Some
estimates have put membership at between four and five million by 1924.
Klan popularity was based on the reaction of conservative rural and small-town America towards the
changes taking place in society during the early 1920s. It appealed particularly to white middle-class
Protestant men squeezed between the big corporations and growing radicalism of the trade unions, but it
does seem to have gained support from a cross-section of whites. The bizarre costumes and ceremonies
that were all part of the secretive rituals of the Klan must have had an appeal for some, but those who
joined the Klan tended to be moved by other issues. They shared common fears about the growth and
influence of the cities, declining social morals, an increasingly assertive black population, Jews, Catholics,
‘racially inferior’ immigrants, emancipated women, jazz, smoking, gambling, more independent teenagers,
and anyone who did not measure up to their idea of ‘one hundred per cent Americanism’. Some of the
Klan’s appeal also lay in its claims that it would sort out political corruption and crime, and the fact that
the Klan actually took control of government in several states such as Indiana and Colorado, must also
ESSAYS • 145
1111 have given the impression that being involved with the Klan could change things. In Utah, for example,
2111 Klan support emerged from resentment towards the Mormons who held a great deal of economic and
3 political influence in the state.
4111 In many respects the appeal of the Klan was negative in that it is easier to define what the Klan was
5 against rather than what it stood for. Quite what was meant by ‘one hundred per cent Americanism’ has
6 never been exactly clear but the sheer range of things they were against was bound to strike a chord with
7 a number of people.
8
9
PRACTICE QUESTION
10111
1 5 Account for the decline of the Ku Klux Klan. (20)
2 (AQA)
3
4 Advice: The answer to this could adopt a two-pronged approach, examining internal factors in the downfall
5 of the Klan (such as their essential negativity, violence and scandal at the top of the organisation) and external
6 influences such as government action on immigration and the impact of the Depression). In a conclusion, it
7 might be worth weighing up whether one or two factors in particular were more important than others.
8
9
20111 Prohibition
1
2 6 Explain the reasons behind Prohibition and determine the extent to which it could be
3 said to have been a failure. (20)
4 (AQA)
5
6 About 65 per cent of the country had already banned alcohol before Prohibition on a national scale went
7 into effect, so in many respects the amendment to the Constitution was simply an extension of what was
8 already happening in most states. There were of course a number of factors behind the movement towards
9 Prohibition, including practical, moral and religious ones.
30 From a practical point of view, it made sense to conserve grain during the war effort, and in addition
1 it could be argued that workers and soldiers would be more efficient in carrying out their duties without
2 the temptation of drink. It was also felt that banning alcohol would solve many social problems of the time
3 such as poor health and crime, specifically domestic violence, which in turn would cut the number of people
4 in prisons as well as reduce poverty, and thereby reduce taxes.
5 Groups such as the American Temperance Society argued that it was morally wrong to drink, espe-
6 cially while men were dying in Europe. The Anti-Saloon League called the beer of German brewers in
7 Milwaukee ‘Kaiser brew’ and portrayed the campaign against alcohol in nationalistic anti-German terms.
8 The Women’s Christian Temperance Union believed that drinking alcohol went against God’s will,
9 and others felt that Prohibition would somehow help to clean up corruption in politics and help Americanise
40 immigrants among whom drinking tended to reach relatively higher levels.
1 Behr has suggested that temperance campaigners received disproportionate media coverage because of
2 the shortage of newsworthy items at the time in isolationist America.
3 In order to ascertain the extent to which Prohibition was a failure it is necessary to examine the aims
4 of those who passed the 18th Amendment and Volstead Act. The main aim was obviously to stop the
45 consumption of alcohol, but it was hoped that this would in turn lead, in the long term, to a reduction in
46 crime, prostitution and sexual promiscuity, and an improvement in health. In the short term, Prohibition
47 did help to conserve grain for the war effort.
48 Initially liquor consumption and arrests for drunkenness declined, with alcohol being too expensive
49222 for most, and the drinking of hard liquor falling by 50 per cent. It did not take long, however, for drinking
to increase to pre-Prohibition levels. Protest drinkers drank more than they would have in order to express
their discontent with the law and what they saw as an infringement of their liberty. Lee has referred to
this as drinking ‘with a sense of high purpose’. The 1920s were an era of change, and non-conformity and
drink became a part of that. Vogue drinking was not necessarily related to Prohibition but probably
more to changing social values. There was also a tendency during the 1920s for greater amounts of hard
liquor to be drunk, as it was easier to smuggle and therefore cheaper. Thornton has suggested that
Prohibition of alcohol also led drinkers to switch to substances such as opium, marijuana and cocaine. By
1929 there were 32,000 speakeasies in New York, twice the number of saloons before Prohibition.
Crime, both directly and indirectly related to drinking, also soared. Prohibition was simply too diffi-
cult to enforce from the outset, given the resources the government was prepared to expend. Not enough
agents were employed (never above 3,000) nor were they sufficiently well paid to resist the temptations of
bribery. The country’s huge landed borders with Canada and Mexico as well as 29,000 kilometres of coast-
line contributed to about 95 per cent of smuggled liquor actually getting into the US. The police were either
diverted from their enforcement of other laws – half the police in Chicago were apparently on the payroll
of notorious gangster Al Capone – or simply stopped enforcing Prohibition, as did the New York State
Police from 1923. Arrests in the country for drunk and disorderly conduct rose by 41 per cent and arrests
for drink-driving increased by 81 per cent during Prohibition (Thornton). In 1932 alone there were 44,678
jail sentences for alcohol-related crime, by which time prisons were full to bursting. In the large cities the
murder rate rose from 5.6 per 100,000 to nearly 10 during Prohibition. Bowen says there were over 400
gang-related murders a year in Chicago alone. Crime never returned to pre-Prohibition levels and the whole
system was brought into disrepute with hundreds of government agents and thousands of policemen taking
bribes, juries being got to, gangsters such as Capone, O’Bannion and Moran flouting the law, and millions
of ordinary people being turned into lawbreakers. In addition the government lost huge amounts of revenue
from beer and yet more money had to be spent on prisons. Respect for the government and the Constitution
declined, as the measure had never been supported by the public, the rich and working-class immigrant
communities being particularly resentful.
If anything ‘the noble experiment’ had made worse the very problems it had been intended to solve.
From a health point of view there were no standards for illegally-made alcohol and deaths from poisoned
liquor rose from 1,064 in 1920 to 4,154 in 1925. In 1932 teetotaller John D. Rockefeller admitted that
drinking had generally increased, while crime grew hugely, becoming better organised and more violent.
The banning of alcohol also made thousands officially unemployed, while hypocrisy could be seen at the
highest level, with Harding having alcohol smuggled into the White House and his Attorney-General,
Harry Daughtery, accepting bribes from bootleggers. LaGuardia and Wenburn, who argue Prohibition was
a success, have looked at data for the first two or three years, e.g. the death rate from alcoholism had
been cut by 80 per cent in 1921 from pre-war levels, and alcohol-related crime also dropped markedly.
They also attribute the rise in crime subsequently to changing social norms and lower standards of policing,
but overwhelmingly the evidence seems to suggest that Prohibition failed to achieve all of its major
aims. The only other developed country to attempt Prohibition at this time, Finland, also abandoned it
after a decade.
PRACTICE QUESTION
7 How far was Prohibition responsible for the rise in organised crime? (20)
(AQA)
Advice: In order to answer this question effectively you will need to do more than simply produce figures to
show that organised crime increased during the 1920s. There has to be evidence to link cause and effect, which
means that it is important to concentrate specifically on organised crime related to alcohol before examining
the wider increase in organised crime.
ESSAYS • 147
1111
2111 Causes of the Depression
3
4111 8 How far was the main cause of the Depression in the US overproduction, and to what
5 extent has Herbert Hoover been unfairly criticised for his role in dealing with the
6 Depression? (45)
7 (OCR)
8
9 Historians tend to agree on which factors caused the Depression but they usually differ on emphasis.
10111 Overproduction was certainly an issue in the run-up to the Depression but had wealth during the 1920s
1 been more equitably distributed, consumer demand could have been sustained for a longer period. Over
2 70 per cent of dividend income went to the richest 1 per cent of the population. There was, however, a
3 worldwide problem with overproduction, particularly overproduction of food, and this had been an issue
4 since the early 1920s, although it was not until 1929 that a drastic fall in domestic demand took place.
5 Foreign markets had already disappeared by this time. The reluctance of Republican administrations to
6 intervene sufficiently to aid farmers and the tendency of many farmers not to diversify in terms of what
7 they produced made problems worse. Alan Brinkley has pointed to a lack of diversification in the economy
8 as a whole, citing the particular dependence on the motor industry. When it went into decline, so did many
9 industries linked to it such as oil, rubber, glass, steel and leather.
20111 There were also clearly fundamental weaknesses in the banking system with over 30,000 independent
1 banks at the start of the 1920s, many of them small with limited capital, and not necessarily well managed.
2
They often made purely speculative loans, and were vulnerable to sudden large-scale withdrawals or runs.
3
Five thousand banks collapsed between 1923 and 1930. The US had lent a great deal of money to Latin
4
America and Europe after the war, and when Germany, for example, experienced economic problems it
5
had a knock-on effect. Protective tariffs had also made it difficult for countries recovering from the effects
6
of war to export to the US. Some have criticised the role of the Federal Reserve Board, which acted as a
7
kind of regulatory body for the banking system. In 1928 it raised interest rates to try to reduce stock market
8
speculation. Monetarists have argued that this contributed to a contraction in the money supply, which
9
had disastrous results, although Keynesians have argued that the drop in consumer spending came first
30
1 and that is what led to a contraction in the money supply.
2 Sustained prosperity could only be based on new consumers or further investment from existing share-
3 holders on the stock market, but as demand slowed many realised they had bought shares at inflated prices.
4 Sufficient production only becomes overproduction when there is a slowdown in people buying. Sustained
5 consumer purchasing would only have been possible if more people had genuinely shared in the prosperity
6 of the 1920s, and the fact that this was not the case meant that at some point overproduction was inevitable.
7 There was a limit to the number of people who could afford a car or a fridge unless real wages rose for
8 more workers. A vast secondhand car market also gave consumers a cheaper alternative to a newly manu-
9 factured model as the economy faltered. At root, therefore, the unequal distribution of income was probably
40 the main cause of the Depression.
1 Hoover was the most able of the three post-war Republican Presidents, but he was elected to continue
2 similar policies, i.e. minimal government intervention in the economy, tax cuts, balanced budgets and main-
3 taining low interest rates. In addition, his own background as a self-made millionaire reinforced his views
4 that individuals thrived when the government pursued a laissez-faire policy. At the time of his election, he
45 appeared to have good reason for promising ‘a chicken in every pot’ and ‘a car in every garage’, but things
46 soon began to go wrong.
47 Galbraith has suggested that Hoover was badly advised at the time by economists, calling them ‘almost
48 uniquely perverse’ in their arguments that budgets must be balanced and their fears of the inflationary
49222 consequences of leaving the gold standard. To an extent, even with this advice, Hoover believed that
the causes of the Depression lay outside the US with issues such as overproduction and instability in other
countries. In his memoirs he blamed the First World War for the problems. Given that he felt the causes
of Depression were beyond his control, it is likely he felt that the solution to it was also. Michael Bernstein
has in a sense supported this line by arguing that the Depression went on for so long because it came
too late for the motor and construction industries to help, and too soon for emerging industries
such as aviation and electrics to help. This suggests that there was a limit to what any President could
have done.
Hoover, however, did not simply sit by waiting for the economy to right itself. As a response to the
crash, by the end of November Hoover had met with railroad presidents urging them not to stop invest-
ment in planned track building, asked business leaders to continue with investment plans and to maintain
wage levels and targets, and encouraged mayors and governors to increase spending on public works. His
commitment to a balanced budget and belief in voluntarism rather than federal intervention, however, was
strong. He also believed that the problems were more psychological than economic, and in the winter of
1930/1 relief payments were halved and many desperate families taken off the relief rolls. The Hawley-
Smoot Tariff Act of 1930 raised duties in the hope that American industry would be further protected from
competition, but other countries retaliated by making it more difficult for American exports. A thousand
economists petitioned Hoover not to sign the Bill – but he did. Brogan calls it the most unaccountable
action of his career. In October 1930 Hoover set up an Emergency Committee for Employment to coor-
dinate voluntary relief agencies, typifying his faith in voluntary action. There was no dole in the US and
millions became dependent on soup kitchens and private charity for their survival.
Had Hoover increased government spending in 1931 there could have been improvements, but instead
he cut spending on the grounds that less tax was being collected, and then put up taxes in 1932 making
things worse. In June 1931, Hoover proposed a one-year moratorium on all intergovernmental debts, thus
stemming the tide for a short time, but within months the downward spiral continued. It was not until
the winter of 1931/2 that he modified the voluntary approach slightly. Hoover’s most significant move came
in December 1931 when he set up an Emergency Reconstruction Finance Corporation to authorise huge
loans to insurance companies, railroads and banks to try to stimulate new investment. But many did not
want to borrow, much of the money went to large clients, and the purpose of the venture was essentially
to restore confidence rather than actually to help needy groups. Early in 1932 Hoover signed the Glass-
Steagall Act allocating $750 million of gold reserves for loans to private businesses.
Nothing Hoover did was enough. In 1983 Robert McElvaine called Hoover ‘a man of principle’ and
argued that he was more compassionate than many have portrayed him, believing not in ‘rugged individ-
ualism’ but in ‘progressive individualism’, i.e. communities of ‘socially responsible individuals’ helping
the unemployed, but even McElvaine regards Hoover’s ‘voluntary charity, local and state relief’ as wholly
inadequate. He did however intervene more than his predecessors, doubling public works expenditure in
three years and in 1932 taking the federal budget $2.7 billion into the red, the largest peacetime deficit
in US history. It should also be said that the Democrats had little to offer as an alternative, and Franklin
D. Roosevelt’s New Deal remained vague and short on detail. In this light, Hoover probably has been
judged too harshly, but for the millions living lives of desperation, not knowing where the next meal was
coming from, for the hundreds of thousands of hobos and ‘Hooverville’ dwellers much more could have
been done.
Hoover was a product of his times, a prisoner to his party’s policies, and a slave to an American ethos
which valued individual initiative and rejected government intervention. Nevertheless he must take a great
share of responsibility for failing to take more direct action to alleviate the worst effects of the Depression.
He was simply not a politician – he was an engineer and a superbly efficient bureaucrat – and this meant
he lacked Roosevelt’s infectious style and skilled communication.
SOURCES • 149
1111 8 ‘The main cause of the Depression was that too many Americans did not share in
2111 the prosperity of the 1920s.’ Discuss. (45)
3 (OCR)
4111
5
6 Essay plan
7 Introduction: Indicate main line of argument but also mention other possibly significant factors.
8
9 Para 1: Examine the groups who did share in the prosperity of the times, e.g. businessmen and urban
10111 workers.
1 Para 2: Look at the groups who did not share in the prosperity of the period, such as farmers and African
2 Americans, and produce some sort of statistical evidence to show how those at the top benefited
3 much more than those at the bottom.
4
5 Para 3: Consider the argument that had prosperity been more widely distributed consumer spending could
6 have been sustained long enough to avoid serious depression and link to para 4.
7 Para 4: Discuss the idea that prosperity was too dependent on a limited number of industries, e.g. car
8 manufacturing and construction.
9
20111 Para 5: Consider other factors that may have contributed to the downturn, such as: the banking system;
1 the international situation; overproduction; and lack of government intervention.
2 Conclusion: Should probably decide that the maldistribution of wealth was a major cause of problems.
3
4
5
6 Part 3: Sources
7
8 1 Society in the 1920s
9
30 ■ Source A: Butler Act, Tennessee state law
1
2 Be it Enacted, by the General Assembly of the State of Tennessee, that it shall be unlawful for any teacher
3 in any of the universities, normals, and all other public schools in the State, which are supported in whole
4 or in part by the public school funds of the State, to teach the theory that denies the story of the divine
5 creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order
6 of animals.
7
8 ■ Source B: Clarence Darrow, defence lawyer in the ‘Monkey Trial’
9
Here we find to-day as brazen and as bold an attempt to destroy learning as was made in the Middle Ages
40
and the open difference is we have not provided that malefactors shall be burned at the stake. But there is
1
time for that, your Honor. We have to approach these things gradually . . . If to-day you can take a thing
2
like evolution and make it a crime to teach it in the public school . . . at the next session you may ban
3
books and newspapers . . . Ignorance and fanaticism are ever busy and need feeding. Always they are anxious
4
and gloating for more.
45
46 ■ Source C: Frederick L. Allen writing about Prohibition and Al Capone in 1931
47
48 It is said that he had discovered that there was big money in the newly outlawed liquor business. He was
49222 fired with the hope of gaining control of the whole bootlegging and speakeasy operations in the city of
Chicago. Within three years it was said that he had seven hundred men at his disposal, many of them
experts in the use of the Thompson sub-machine gun. As the profits rolled in, the new ‘King of Chicago’
learned to manage politics and politicians and had installed his own mayor in office. There were over 500
gang murders in all, but few of the murderers were arrested. Careful planning, money for bribes, intimi-
dation of witnesses and the refusal of any gangster to testify against any other met that danger.
■ Source D: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tales of the Jazz Age (1922)
The parties were bigger – the pace was faster – the shows were broader – the buildings were higher – the
morals were looser – and the liquor was cheaper.
■ Source E: Walter Lippmann, ‘The Causes of Political Indifference Today’, Atlantic Monthly,
139, no. 2, February (1927), pp. 265–7
The questions which really engage the emotions of the masses . . . manifest themselves in the controver-
sies over prohibition, the Ku Klux Klan, Romanism, Fundamentalism, immigration. These, rather than the
tariff, taxation, credit and corporate control, are the issues which divide the American people . . . These
questions . . . arise out of the great migration of the last fifty years, out of the growth of cities . . . Prohibition,
the Ku Klux Klan, Fundamentalism, and xenophobia are an extreme but authentic expression of the poli-
tics, the social outlook, and the religion of the older American village civilization making its last stand
against what looks to it like an alien invasion. The alien invasion is in fact the new America produced by
the growth and prosperity of America.
EDEXCEL QUESTION FORMAT
The questions and answers that follow are based on the Edexcel style.
(a) Study Sources C and D. What can you learn from Sources C and D about
Prohibition? (6)
(b) Use your own knowledge to explain why Prohibition failed. (10)
(c) Study Sources C and E. Assess the value of these two Sources to a historian studying
American society in the 1920s. (10)
(d) Study Sources A and B. Does Darrow (Source B) agree with the views expressed in
Source A. Explain your answer by reference to both Sources. (10)
(e) Study Sources A and E and use your own knowledge. Do you agree with the view that
the US was an intolerant society in the 1920s? Explain your answer by reference to
these two Sources and your own knowledge. (24)
(a) Source C suggests that although officially alcohol had been banned, the supply and drinking of it
continued anyway, except that the government did not collect any taxes from the sales, and the control of
the liquor business fell into the hands of gangsters who became powerful enough to effectively run cities.
One of the aims of those who campaigned for Prohibition was to cut crime. Source C, by focusing on the
most notorious gangster of the period, seems to suggest that crime actually got worse – with Al Capone
having possibly ‘seven hundred men at his disposal’ and managing to install ‘his own mayor in office.’
Source D also implies that some of the aims of ‘the noble experiment’ were not met. One of the aims of
the temperance lobby had been to improve moral values in the US as well as stopping the consumption
of alcohol. Scott Fitzgerald’s comments that ‘the morals were looser – the liquor was cheaper’ seem to
SOURCES • 151
1111 confirm that, if anything, Prohibition was counter-productive. Both Sources C and D therefore support
2111 the view that Prohibition failed to achieve its aims.
3
4111 (b) Prohibition failed for a number of reasons, but mainly because large numbers of Americans did not
5 want to stop drinking. It could be argued that certain pressure groups such as the Anti-Saloon League had
6 come to exert a disproportionate influence on government policy. Others saw the amendment to the
7 Constitution as an infringement of personal liberty, and, for many, alcohol became part and parcel of the
8 new culture of the ‘Jazz Age’. If one adds to that a reluctance on the part of government to actually spend
9 enough money on ensuring that Prohibition was enforced, then it is possible to see why it failed.
10111 The number of agents to enforce the laws was never above 3,000 for the whole country – there were
1 32,000 speakeasies in New York alone. The police in many areas gave up on alcohol when they saw it pulling
2 resources away from dealing with more serious crime. Many police officers and politicians also ended up
3 on the payroll of gangsters and bootleggers, which had a corrosive effect on law and order and the political
4 system generally. Given the huge landed and coastal borders of the US, the prevention of smuggled liquor
5 would always have been difficult to enforce, and by 1932 it had become apparent that it would only be a
6 matter of time before Prohibition was repealed.
7
(c) It could be said that Source C concentrates only on the situation in one city of the US. Given that
8
even today Chicago is the murder capital of the country, and that in the 1920s its proximity to the Canadian
9
border and good transport links made it an ideal location for bootlegging, it could be argued that Chicago
20111
was far from typical of the country as a whole. Evidence would definitely suggest that bootlegging and
1
illegal drinking went on at a higher rate in the cities, particularly those with larger proportions of immi-
2
grants. Source C, however, does accurately reflect the reality of Capone’s rule in Chicago and as such does
3
give the historian a good insight into the rise of organised crime that took place during the 1920s as well
4
as reactions to Prohibition.
5
Source E also concentrates on negative aspects of society, suggesting that people did not care about
6
serious political issues such as ‘the tariff, taxation, credit and corporate control’ but were more concerned
7
with emotive issues arising from immigration such as xenophobia and the influence of Roman Catholics,
8
and Prohibition. This sheds light on a number of issues which arose during the 1920s. Lippmann also gives
9
historians an idea of other trends during the period such as ‘growth and prosperity’, and clearly reflects
30
the tensions between what he calls ‘the older American village civilization’, and ‘the new America’.
1
Used together, the Sources give the historian a very good idea of some of the major issues that domin-
2
ated the 1920s, although neither Source necessarily gives an overview of society, much detail, or covers
3
other issues during the period such as the Wall Street crash, the emergence of mass consumerism, or the
4
changes in culture and social habits during the ‘Roaring Twenties’.
5
6 (d) Source A, from a Tennessee law, states that it is illegal ‘to teach the theory’ of evolution in schools and
7 insists that the biblical story of creation must be adhered to. Clarence Darrow who was the defence lawyer
8 in the ‘Monkey Trial’ disagrees most strongly with Source A, calling it ‘an attempt to destroy learning’ and
9 suggesting that it may be the thin end of the wedge in the sense that censorship of teachers may extend to
40 ‘books and newspapers’. He also, for good measure, implies that those supporting the Tennessee law are
1 ignorant and fanatical.
2
3 (e) In many respects the US was definitely an intolerant society in the 1920s. Some of the intolerance was
4 a hangover from the First World War and a reaction to the events in Russia in 1917, when anti-foreign
45 propaganda had been stirred up to high levels. In particular the Bolshevik Revolution aroused fears of the
46 political left and the many foreigners and immigrants associated with such movements. The results of
47 the Palmer Raids confirmed that Americans had grossly overreacted to what was in reality a non-existent
48 ‘red menace’, and the treatment of anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti suggested that popular feeling as well as
49222 that in government circles was xenophobic.
The meteoric rise of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s also suggests that many ‘old stock’ Americans were
intolerant of the ‘new America’ built on the cities, the growth of industry, and immigration from southern
and eastern Europe and Asia. The government’s introduction of Quota Acts seemed to officially sanction
racist sentiment. Source E confirms how the Klan built up its strength by indicating that issues such as
‘Romanism, Fundamentalism, [and] immigration’ were what stirred people up. Throughout the period
there was also a great deal of anti-black feeling in the US.
Source E also touches on the moral backlash to the more relaxed morals of the post-war period by
mentioning Prohibition. Despite the good intentions of its backers, it too reflected an intolerance of a kind,
and a willingness to intervene in people’s personal lives. Source A shows that there was even a reluctance
to embrace decades-old scientific thinking in favour of a rigidly literal interpretation of ‘the story of the
divine creation of man as taught in the Bible’.
In other respects, however, America led the way in culture, with writers such as Scott Fitzgerald and
Hemingway making their mark, and jazz music becoming extremely popular. In business, too, new methods
of production were embraced by men like Ford, and mass consumerism developed, suggesting that some
people were quite prepared to embrace new ideas. America then, as now, remained an extremely diverse
society, but in many respects the US in the 1920s was an intolerant society.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE EDEXCEL STYLE

(a) Study Sources A and B. What can you learn from Sources A and B about American society
in the 1920s? (6)
(b) Use your own knowledge to explain why the Ku Klux Klan became so popular in the early
1920s. (10)
(c) Study Sources A and D. Assess the value of these two Sources to a historian studying
US society in the 1920s. (10)
(d) Study Sources C and E. Does Source C agree with Source E that the cities contained the
roots of major social problems in the US? Explain your answer by reference to both
Sources. (10)
(e) Study Sources C and D. Do you agree that Prohibition caused more problems than it was
intended to solve? Explain your answer by reference to these two Sources and your own
knowledge. (24)
2 Boom and bust
■ Source A: Hoover’s ‘New York City speech’, 1928
When the Republican party came into full power . . . it freed and stimulated enterprise, it restored the
Government to its position as an umpire instead of a player in the economic game . . . projection of govern-
ment in business . . . would impair the very basis of liberty and freedom . . . The very essence of equality
of opportunity and of American individualism is that there shall be no domination by any group or combi-
nation in this Republic, whether it be business or political. On the contrary, it demands economic justice
as well as political and social justice. It is no system of laissez faire . . . We are nearer today to the ideal of
the abolition of poverty and fear from the lives of men and women than ever before in any land . . .
■ Source B: Robert La Follette’s Progressive Party platform, 1924
Through control of government, monopoly has steadily extended its absolute dominion to every basic
industry. In violation of law, monopoly has crushed competition, stifled private initiative and independent
SOURCES • 153
1111 enterprise, and without fear of punishment now exacts extortionate profits upon every necessity of life
2111 consumed by the public. The equality of opportunity proclaimed by the Declaration of Independence . . .
3 has been displaced by special privilege for the few . . . The people know monopoly has its representatives
4111 in the halls of Congress, on the Federal bench, and in the executive departments . . . a total of more than
5 600,000 or 26 percent of all farmers . . . have virtually been bankrupted since 1920 in . . . fifteen states alone
6 . . . the direct and logical result of the policies . . . which protected with exorbitant tariffs the industrial
7 magnates, but depressed the prices of the farmers’ products . . .
8
9 Source C: average monthly earnings of US workers in 1929
10111
Farmers in South Carolina $129
1
Town workers in South Carolina $412
2
Town workers in New York $881
3
Fruit farmers in California $1,246
4
5 ■ Source D: selected share prices in cents, The Wall Street Journal, 1928
6
7 March 1928 Sept 1928
8 Montgomery Ward 132 466
9 Union Carbide and Carbon 145 413
20111 Westinghouse 92 313
1 Anaconda Copper 54 162
2 Woolworth 181 251
3
4 ■ Source E: income distribution before the Great Depression, 1929
5
6 Share of income (%)
7 Wealthiest fifth 52
8 Second wealthiest fifth 19
9 Middle fifth 14
30 Second poorest fifth 10
1 Poorest fifth 5
2
3
4
5 The questions and answers that follow are based on the Edexcel style.
6
7 (a) Study Sources C and E. What can you learn from Sources C and E about the distribution
8 of wealth in the US by 1929? (6)
9
(b) Use your own knowledge to explain why share prices rose so much in 1928. (10)
40
1 (c) Study Sources A and D. Assess the value of these two Sources to a historian studying the
2 ‘boom’ of the 1920s. (10)
3
(d) Study Sources A and B. Does Source B agree with Source A that there was ‘no domination
4
by any group or combination’ of government or the economy in 1920s America? Explain
45
your answer by reference to both sources. (10)
46
47 (e) Study Sources B and E. Do you agree that the maldistribution of wealth in the US during
48 the 1920s was a major factor in causing the Great Depression? Explain your answer by
49222 reference to these two sources and your own knowledge. (24)
(a) Both Sources would suggest that certain groups in society did not earn as much as others. Source C
indicates the variations in wage rates in different parts of the country for different jobs, and implies that
even within certain jobs wages could vary enormously: for example, fruit farmers in California clearly out-
earning farmers in South Carolina. The figures for town dwellers also suggest that Northern cities paid
better than Southern ones. Source E does not give as much detail as Source C but in some ways it makes
more of an impact because it clearly shows that the wealthiest fifth of the country earned more than half
of the country’s income, and that the poorest fifth only earned a twentieth.
(b) Share prices rose quickly during the late 1920s, essentially because of the confidence of share buyers.
Share prices effectively lost touch with reality and often did not bear any relation to the actual perform-
ance of companies during the period, which is why, when confidence dipped, the results were disastrous
for some. Buying on margin combined with the increase in the number of loans from banks meant that
more people could afford to buy more shares, but it was the optimism of the period buoyed by great
increases in industrial production and consumer spending which really caused the rise of share prices.
(c) Source A is taken from a 1928 speech by Herbert Hoover, the Republican Presidential candidate and
previously Secretary of Commerce. He clearly has political points to be made regarding the role of his party
in shaping the economic prosperity of the period, saying that it ‘freed and stimulated enterprise’ and safe-
guarded ‘economic justice’. In short, he seems to be claiming the credit for the boom. Given that the speech
is designed to spread a political message it must be used cautiously but that does not mean necessarily that
Republican administrations did not have an effect on prosperity. As a set of statistics Source D is possibly
more reliable than Hoover, but in some ways is more limited than Source A. However, by showing a huge
rise in share prices in 1928, it does seem to confirm the impression given in Hoover’s speech – that the
economy of the country was booming. What neither Source really shows is whether the whole population
was benefiting from the boom.
(d) Source A depicts the government as a neutral ‘umpire’ maintaining liberty and opportunity by ensuring
that there is ‘no domination by any group or combination’ of the economy or politics, and helping to stim-
ulate enterprise. Source B utterly refutes this by stating firmly that industrial monopolies dominated
American society, and had ‘crushed competition’ and ‘stifled private initiative’ as well as replacing equality
of opportunity by ‘special privilege for the few’. La Follette goes on to say that monopoly has bought the
support of politicians, and cites as evidence the tariffs to protect industrial magnates, while government
has done little to help the farmers.
(e) There appears to be strong evidence that maldistribution of wealth in the US contributed greatly to
the Depression, but other factors such as the lack of diversification in the economy, the unsound banking
system, the reluctance of the Republican administration to intervene, and also the impact of the inter-
national situation must also be considered.
La Follette in Source B highlights the plight of the farmers, citing the fact that ‘26% of all farmers’ in
15 states had been virtually bankrupted, and the government, by implication, had been reluctant to help.
Given that a third of all American workers were employed in the agricultural sector any decline in farming
would have serious effects. Throughout the 1920s the majority of farmers struggled, as did other groups
such as miners, cloth workers, women, blacks, new unskilled immigrants and those in the South generally.
With the poorest fifth of the population receiving only 5 per cent of the country’s total income (Source E)
it is hardly surprising that the consumer spending required to sustain prosperity did not materialise. Those
people at the bottom could barely afford their food and rent, never mind fridges, vacuum cleaners and
cars, while the 20 per cent at the top of society earning 52 per cent of its income did not need great numbers
of fridges or cars for their families.
1111 The slowdown in spending can be seen to be a result of the maldistribution of income, and as the
2111 number of cars being sold dropped, along with other consumer products, employers laid off workers or
3 made them part-time, and this further reduced the money supply. As optimism began to falter so did confi-
4111 dence in the stock market and the banking system, which was under-regulated and according to David
5 Kennedy ‘rotten even in good times’. When the government did intervene it put up tariffs, leading to retal-
6 iation abroad and further restricting markets for American goods. There is no doubt that overproduction
7 and other problems in different parts of the world had their impact and set the context for a slowdown,
8 but a wider distribution of income away from the very rich and possibly some of the urban workers would
9 have perhaps allowed the momentum of economic growth to have been maintained.
10111
1
2 ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE EDEXCEL STYLE
3
4 (a) Study Sources A and B. What can you learn from Sources A and B about the way the US
5 economy worked in the 1920s? (6)
6
7 (b) Use your own knowledge to explain why all American workers did not share in the
8 prosperity of the 1920s. (10)
9 (c) Study Sources A and B. Assess the value of these two Sources to a historian studying the
20111 approach of governments to the economy in the 1920s. (10)
1
2 (d) Study Sources C and E. Does Source C support the evidence in Source E that income was
3 distributed unfairly? Explain your answer by reference to both Sources. (10)
4
5 (e) Study Sources A and B. Do you agree that Republican policies in the 1920s contributed
6 significantly to prosperity? Explain your answer by reference to these two Sources and your
7 own knowledge. (24)
8
9
30
2
3
4 1 Report on immigration
5
6 You have been asked to compile a report on the nature and impact of immigration on the US in the years
7 since the Civil War. You should cover such areas as the national origins of immigrants, contributions to
8 the economy and how they feature in crime statistics (particularly in the big cities) and union activity.
9 Information ought to be presented in tables and graphs as well as prose. Textbooks and Internet sources
40 such as Spartacus Educational could be used for research.
1
2
3 2 Were Sacco and Vanzetti guilty?
4
45 Imagine that you have been asked to prepare an appeal against the guilty verdicts passed on Sacco and
46 Vanzetti. Examine the evidence on website http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/ftrials.htm
47 (The Sacco and Vanzetti Trial – Famous Trials – UMKC School of Law) as a starting point and attempt
48 to highlight any inconsistencies in evidence or any behaviour by the judge likely to influence the verdict
49222 of the jury.

Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, McGraw-Hill Spartacus Educational www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk.
(2000). John Traynor, Mastering Modern United States History,
Charles Eagles, America: a Narrative History, Norton Palgrave (2001).
(1999). John Traynor, ‘Prohibition and Organised Crime in the
Alan Farmer and Vivienne Sanders, American History, USA’, Modern History Review, November (2002).
1860–1990, Hodder & Stoughton (2000). Clive Webb, ‘The Ku Klux Klan’, Modern History Review,
J.K. Galbraith, The Great Crash 1929, Penguin (1975). April (2002).
Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University Doug Willoughby and Susan Willoughby, The USA
Press (1983/1995). 1917–45, Heinemann (2000).
John M. Murrin, Paul E. Johnson, James M. McPherson Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
et al., Liberty Equality Power, Harcourt (2001). Longman (1996).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 7
5
6
7
8
9 Franklin D. Roosevelt and
10111
1
2
the New Deal, 1933–1941
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111
1 This chapter focuses upon the federal government’s response to the Great Depression,
2 assessing the aims and success of the measures introduced, and draws particular attention
3 to criticisms aimed at the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR).
4
5
6
8
9 Franklin Delano Roosevelt 1 The agricultural crisis
30 The aims and nature of the New Deal 2 Views from within the administration
1 Financial reforms
2 Providing relief
3 Industrial recovery and reforms Historical skills
4 Agriculture
5 Regional development 1 ‘Alphabet agencies’ task
6 Critics of the New Deal 2 Using art as historical sources
7 The Supreme Court and the New Deal
8 The decline of the New Deal
9
40
1 Essays
2
3 The policies of the New Deal
4 Problems for the New Deal
45 The results of the New Deal
46
47
48
49222
158 • FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT AND THE NEW DEAL, 1933–1941
Chronology
1933 March Inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt

Emergency Banking Relief Act
Truth-in-Securities Act to regulate Wall Street
Civilian Conservation Corps created
May Federal Emergency Relief Administration, Agricultural Adjustment Act
Tennessee Valley Administration created
June National Industrial Recovery Act
Glass-Steagall Act
November Launch of Civil Works Administration
December End of Prohibition
1934 June Securities Exchange Act
Federal Housing Act
August American Liberty League founded
Huey Long’s Share Our Wealth scheme launched
November Mid-term elections, Democratic majorities increased
1935 Start of the Second New Deal
April Works Progress Administration created
May National Recovery Administration struck down by Supreme Court
July National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act) passed
August Social Security Act
Banking Act
Public Utility Holding Company Act
Revenue Act
1936 January Agricultural Adjustment Administration declared unconstitutional
November Re-election of Roosevelt
1937 February FDR presented his Judiciary Reorganisation Bill to Congress
April Wagner Act upheld by the Supreme Court
September Wagner-Steagall National Housing Act
Autumn ‘Roosevelt Recession’ began
1938 February Second Agricultural Adjustment Act passed
June Fair Labor Standards Act
November Moderate gains for Republicans in mid-term elections
1939 April Executive Office of the President created
1941 December US entered the Second World War
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
The man who was inaugurated as the 32nd President of the United States on 4 March 1933 was to become
one of the most eminent holders of that office. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, or FDR as he is known, stands
alongside Washington and Lincoln as a saviour and shaper of his nation. In common with these illustrious
predecessors Roosevelt faced problems of an overwhelming magnitude. The man who would lead his
1111 country through to the closing months of the Second World War had to first do battle against the economic
2111 collapse that had begun in mid-1929 and had since brought the nation to its knees.
3 In the early years of the 1930s the economic and social situation in the US worsened. Manufacturing
4111 output and investment fell as people put purchases of goods such as cars and refrigerators on hold. By 1933
5 unemployment officially stood at 25 per cent. In addition, many of those with work suffered a reduction
6 in hours and wages. Agriculture, as well as industry, was in crisis as farms produced more to pay off debts
7 only to see the prices for their produce fall still further. As deflation became entrenched, people queued to
8 withdraw their money from banks and from Saving and Loans schemes. This contributed significantly to
9 waves of bank collapses throughout the early 1930s. The nation was in a dire state and as the final weeks
10111 of Hoover’s ‘lame duck’ period dragged on there seemed no way out of the crisis. People and business alike
1 turned to President-elect Roosevelt.
2 Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born in 1882 to a wealthy New York family of Dutch descent. Inspired
3 by the example of his cousin, Theodore Roosevelt, he first worked as a lawyer before entering politics at
4 an early age, rising to the level of state governor by 1928. He quickly rose to prominence within the
5 Democratic Party, acquiring a reputation as an independently minded reformer. As governor he took an
6 interventionist stance in New York in response to the Wall Street crash and the ensuing Great Depression,
7 striving more than most to ensure the provision of relief to the needy. He inspired loyalty from those who
8 worked alongside him and generated faith among the people he served. Appealing for wide support for his
9 efforts to tackle the Depression, he famously told the nation during his first inaugural address ‘the only
20111 thing we have to fear is fear itself’. He was giving notice that his administration would not shirk the respon-
1 sibilities it had assumed and would provide bold leadership. This charismatic man, who made a point of
2 standing, despite having lost almost all use of his legs through polio, was the antithesis of the insipid Hoover.
3 America believed him.
4
5
6 The aims and nature of the New Deal
7
8 When FDR accepted his party’s nomination to be the Democratic candidate in the 1932 Presidential elec-
9 tions he had given a victory speech in which he spoke of his ambitions for the nation, including a ‘new
30 deal for the American people’. The phrase stuck and now stands as the epithet to 1930s America. Everyone
1 knew the name New Deal, but no one was really sure what it amounted to. In his inaugural address, little
2 in the way of specifics was divulged as the new President pledged that putting people to work was his
3 priority.
4 In short the New Deal was a series of measures to stabilise business and prompt economic recovery
5 while providing relief to those who were suffering. Reforms were also an integral part of FDR’s plans as he
6 sought to restore confidence in the nation’s financial institutions and ensure that some of the more obvious
7 mistakes of the 1920s could not be repeated. The New Deal should not be thought of as a coherent, care-
8 fully thought out programme. To an extent the steps that FDR took were simply reactions to events. Some
9 pieces of legislation contradicted others, while some were deemed by the courts to be unconstitutional and
40 therefore unlawful. Nor should the programme be viewed as being exclusively the work of President
1 Roosevelt. He assembled a talented group of advisers, the so called ‘Brains Trust’, that on occasion pres-
2 sured him to act on issues in which he had little desire to become involved. Furthermore, there are examples
3 of notable New Deal legislation that originated in Congress rather than the White House. Augmenting this
4 pressure were conservative opponents, who favoured less government intervention, and radicals, who
45 favoured more fundamental reforms. It is clear that a full understanding of the New Deal needs to take
46 into account wider aspects of American polity and society in the 1930s.
47 The torrent of legislation that was the New Deal has been categorised by historians who endeavour to
48 ascribe boundaries to measures that were almost certainly not conceptualised as distinct entities. The period
49222 is commonly split into two. The First New Deal ran from 1933 to 1934 and introduced policies primarily
Figure 7.1
Migratory Mexican
field worker’s home,
California
designed to provide relief to the millions suffering the effects of the Depression and promote economic
recovery. Owing to various factors, including a lack of recovery and growing opposition, there was a shift
of emphasis in 1935 when a more radical Second New Deal began. This wave of legislation brought in a
more coherent set of permanent reforms that included significant implications for business and labour and
created a national system of benefits for the first time in the US. While bearing this apparent change of
direction in mind it is arguably easier to comprehend the New Deal as a whole by examining it thematically,
taking in how it impacted upon America sector by sector.
Financial reforms
Dire necessity dictated that Roosevelt’s first actions after his inauguration were to try to rescue the banking
system. To forestall more closures, a ‘bank holiday’ was declared while options were considered. The
resulting Emergency Banking Bill set the trend as the first of many executive-initiated reforms as it was
swiftly passed by a willing Congress. The Act gave support to stronger and, as critics pointed out, larger
banks and closed those most at risk. Roosevelt gave a radio address soon after to convince worried citizens.
He explained the steps to be taken and said: ‘I can assure you that it is safer to keep your money in a
reopened bank than under the mattress.’ His actions succeeded in their intentions as banking was stabilised.
Further legislation in the first ‘Hundred Days’ of his administration guaranteed bank deposits and
during the Second New Deal control over the banking system was centralised. Action was also taken to
devalue the US dollar and to restore credibility to Wall Street. In sum, Roosevelt’s banking and financial
reforms sought to strengthen the existing order within US capital by introducing more controlled systems
and ridding it of some of its flaws.
Providing relief
Roosevelt had demonstrated his compassion for the needy when he was governor of New York. Once in
the White House his team quickly set about accommodating within America’s closely held ethos of indi-
vidualism the notion that the state had a responsibility to directly intervene on behalf of the less fortunate.
Action fell broadly into two categories: work relief and social security.
1111 The Federal Emergency Relief Administration Figure 7.2 Cartoon illustrating how the
2111 (FERA), established in May 1933, was the first instance Depression affected farms
3 of the US federal government providing money to those
THE NEW TREND IN EASTER FASHIONS
4111 out of work. It distributed money to states, which would
5 then be matched by them and passed on to the un-
6 employed. There were problems encountered in the
7 administering of such a vast project as the federal appa-
8 ratus in the states simply did not exist and the amounts
9 given were usually small. But FERA no doubt saved many
10111 from starvation and represents a watershed in the rela-
1 tionship between the government and the people. The
2 New Deal saw the establishment of the American welfare
3 state when the Social Security Act of 1935 was passed. It
4 was a piece of legislation that would have an impact in
5 the long term, providing pensions and unemployment
6 benefit based on contributions from both employees and
7 employers. It excluded several groups at the bottom of
8 society, for example domestic servants and agricultural
9 labourers, and sidestepped the issue of health insurance.
20111 Yet credit must be given to this Act because it broke
1 new ground and laid the foundations of the modern
2 American welfare system.
3 Creating government agencies to provide work was
4 considered preferable to handing out dole. In November
5 1933 the head of FERA, Harry Hopkins, created a work
6 relief programme, the Civil Works Administration,
7 (CWA) which placed an emphasis on providing manual
8 labour. Another early example of such a scheme was the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). It provided
9 employment for young men carrying out work such as planting trees and draining marshland in exchange
30 for a meagre wage, most of which was sent directly to their families. The Public Works Administration
1 (PWA) kept the construction industry going and attempted to stimulate the economy through the building
2 of schools, dams, bridges, etc. with a $3.3 billion budget. During the Second New Deal in 1935 the Works
3 Progress Administration (WPA) built on earlier efforts at providing work relief. It eventually employed an
4 average of 2.1 million men during its eight-year life in the construction of public projects such as schools
5 and bridges. Its wage levels were adjusted to reflect local economic conditions, so that Northern workers
6 got more than Southern workers. One of the principles behind all work relief schemes was to bypass the
7 giving of handouts, which people often found demeaning, yet avoiding paying people so much that they
8 would be deterred from taking a ‘proper’ job.
9
40
1 Industrial recovery and reforms
2
3 The cornerstone of the early New Deal was the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA). This ambitious
4 measure, passed on 16 June 1933 (the last of FDR’s ‘Hundred Days’), attempted to promote recovery and
45 reconcile the interests of business and labour. To counteract deflation anti-trust laws were suspended, which
46 meant that manufacturers could now join together and agree prices. In return for this potentially mono-
47 polistic, pro-business reform manufacturers had to accept a series of regulatory codes. These codes had a
48 positive impact upon wages, hours and conditions, for example child labour was banned. But all too often
49222 the codes were drawn up by big business in their own favour.
Workers were given the right to freely organise themselves into unions under Section 7(a) of NIRA.
However, the legislation was difficult to enforce. Unions rightly claimed that the right of ‘collective bargain-
ing’ was insufficient in the face of business hostility. Although NIRA marked a new beginning in US
industrial relations, it ultimately failed to promote industrial recovery with its Public Works Administration
programmes. In May 1935 the Supreme Court declared NIRA unconstitutional and therefore void.
The rights of labour were reasserted and strengthened in the ‘Second Hundred Days’, when the National
Labor Relations Act was passed in July 1935. This legislation had started life on Capitol Hill; Roosevelt
himself was reluctant to become embroiled in labour legislation and only threw his weight behind senator
Robert Wagner’s bill once it became clear that the Supreme Court would strike down NIRA. This time the
right to collective bargaining was to be guaranteed with enforcement mechanisms and the National Labor
Relations Board (NLRB) was set up to oversee labour–industry relations. This was an interventionist
measure that strengthened labour and promoted a healthier economy by reducing the number of indus-
trial disputes in the following years. The ‘Wagner Act’, upheld by the Supreme Court in 1937, is remembered
as one of the landmarks of the New Deal years.
Some business leaders supported Roosevelt’s attempts to reform relations between industry, govern-
ment and labour. However, many resented the intrusion into their affairs and became critical of FDR.
The Public Utility Holding Company Act provided another cause for complaint for some in the ‘Second
Hundred Days’. A small number of giant companies had come to dominate the provision of power in
many regions, avoiding regulation in the process. Roosevelt’s determined stance resulted in the eventual
reorganisation of the sector. The issue was fought bitterly but, like other New Deal legislation, it ultimately
sought to strengthen business by clamping down on its worst excesses.
Agriculture
Already weak in the 1920s, farming had been badly hit by the Depression. At the heart of the problem lay
overproduction. The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 attempted to arrest the decline in farm prices
by curtailing production. Farmers were paid to reduce the amounts of cotton, corn and pigs they produced
by a system of subsidies that stabilised farm income. The Act proved more popular with farmers, and partic-
ularly landlords, than with the public – who objected to the slaughter of six million piglets in times of
economic hardship. Throughout the mid-1930s, more and more land was taken out of production and
prices slowly rose. This was partly a direct consequence of the administration’s policies as well as the effects
of a severe drought and the lower value of the dollar. The gains brought by the Agricultural Adjustment
Administration (AAA) along with other legislation concerning electrification, conservation and the refi-
nancing of mortgages went a long way to countering the effects of the Depression, drought and subsequent
dust storms of 1934 to 1935. The Act became another major New Deal casualty of the Supreme Court when
it was declared unconstitutional in January 1936. However, another Agricultural Adjustment Administration
was established in 1938, which gave farming a long lasting presence in Washington DC.
Regional development
One of the major successes of the New Deal was an attempt to develop one of the poorest regions of the
nation, the Tennessee valley, which covers 40,000 square miles across seven states. Drawing inspiration
from the Progressives of the previous decade, the power of the Tennessee river was to be harnessed to bring
cheap electricity to the region. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), established in May 1933, organised
the construction of 20 dams and the formation of cooperatives, welfare and educational programmes in
an area where only one in fifty farms had electricity. The administration had to battle against privately
owned energy companies who saw it as an encroachment upon their domain. Ultimately the scheme did
1111 more than provide power and create jobs. It encouraged further investment from industrialists thus
2111 advancing the economic development of this poor area.
3 Nature augmented economic problems in 1934 and 1935 when a severe drought hit the central states
4111 of the US. Although somewhat fortuitous for the government’s drive to reduce production in agriculture,
5 the drought and accompanying dust storms caused severe hardship for countless thousands of farm families.
6 Newly established federal agencies such as the AAA, CCC and the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) provided
7 much needed aid and modernisation for rural America but could not pretend to be an instant panacea.
8 There was a wave of migration from the ‘Dust Bowl’ as people headed west in search of work. The federal
9 government was successful in reducing the number of farm foreclosures and did strive to improve condi-
10111 tions for migrant workers through the Resettlement Administration (RA), however the artistic works of
1 contemporaries such as Woody Guthrie, Dorothea Lange and John Steinbeck stand as testament to the
2 enduring suffering of millions of Americans during the 1930s.
3
4
5 Critics of the New Deal
6
7 Once the immediate threat of collapse had been removed cracks began to appear in Roosevelt’s broad
8 support. The mid-1930s saw various attacks upon the New Deal from both within politics and from popular
9 movements throughout the nation. Roosevelt was criticised from both left and right – accused of being
20111 both a fascist and a communist.
1 In terms of membership, the 1930s represented the heyday of American communism. Communists
2 criticised the New Deal as a capitalist tool and certainly FDR’s main mission was to save capitalism in the
3 United States. Apart from the formation of Farmer-Labor parties in parts of the mid-west, little organised
4 headway was made towards public ownership of resources. There simply was not enough support in the
5 country for such dogma. The workers and the unemployed stood by Roosevelt. After all, he had given them
6 unions and relief, and his anti-elitist rhetoric appealed directly to them.
7 The flamboyant Louisiana senator, Huey Long, launched his radical Share Our Wealth scheme after
8 he became disillusioned with Roosevelt following the First New Deal. He proposed placing limits on wages
9 and inheritances for the extremely rich, which would then be shared out more evenly. With a claimed five
30 million supporters nationwide talk of a third party campaign in the 1936 Presidential elections seemed
1 credible. But Long was killed in Baton Rouge in September 1935, apparently by one of his own bodyguards
2 during a scuffle with an opponent. It can be argued that Roosevelt’s Revenue Tax Act of 1935, which
3 increased the higher rates of income tax, was designed to undercut the appeal of Long’s plan.
4 Another fanciful idea to end the Depression was Dr Francis Townsend’s Pension Plan. This amounted
5 to giving the retired a $200 monthly pension on condition that it would be spent within the month, thus
6 boosting consumption and production and increasing the number of jobs available. Townsend’s prescrip-
7 tion was understandably popular with the aged but was totally unworkable in practice. However, the
8 influence of this popular left-wing idea can be seen in the Social Security Act of the Second New Deal,
9 which introduced a national system of pensions for the first time in the United States.
40 Left-wing critics lacked the electoral base from which to pose a serious threat to Roosevelt’s continu-
1 ation in office, but they demonstrated that there was mass discontent throughout the nation, among young
2 and old, farmer and factory worker. The popularity of these critics’ ideas showed Roosevelt that the
3 public desired more far-reaching action. In 1935 the Second New Deal was launched in response to the
4 continuing economic stagnation as well as to head off his critics. It brought a change of emphasis as legis-
45 lation encompassing ideas that had been widely supported, such as progressive taxation and social security,
46 was passed.
47 Criticism also came from the right. The Liberty League was a group of wealthy businessmen and conser-
48 vatives from both major political parties who launched vitriolic attacks against FDR accusing him of bringing
49222 communism to the US. The business community had begun to turn against the New Deal after the initial
‘Hundred Days’. Section 7(a) of NIRA appalled many who were simply not willing to contemplate the
unionisation of the workforce. Many on the right believed in limited government and so it was inevitable
that FDR’s interventionist administration would not enjoy their support. However right-wing groups and
politicians had less of an impact than the left until Roosevelt’s second administration began in 1937.
The Supreme Court and the New Deal
The New Deal’s most effective opponent proved to be the Supreme Court. Since 1803 it had assumed the
right to judge void any Act of Congress that it considered contravened the Constitution. In 1935 the Court
unanimously declared NIRA to be unconstitutional. The justices ruled that the federal government had no
business intervening in intra-state trade as outlined in Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution. All NIRA
codes were therefore void as this major piece of New Deal legislation floundered. A divided Court declared
the Agricultural Adjustment Act unconstitutional the following year.
FDR signalled his intent after his second inauguration when he presented Congress with his Judiciary
Reorganisation Bill. It amounted to a crude attempt to ‘pack’ the Supreme Court with sympathetic justices.
Roosevelt may have been able to claim that the Supreme Court was standing in the way of much needed
reform, for which he had an impressive mandate, but he had misjudged America’s sentiments towards its
institutions. The bill was defeated in July 1937. However, the Supreme Court, with a nod to reality, was
beginning to uphold New Deal legislation. Although Roosevelt had been defeated, his ideas won the day.
The Supreme Court had sanctioned the extension of the President’s powers into the realms of regulating
the economy.
The decline of the New Deal
For Roosevelt an unforeseen and unfortunate by-product of the Supreme Court battle was the strength-
ening of opposition to himself and the New Deal. Conservative Southern Democrats joined a bolstered
Republican Party in checking the power of the executive. For the President a series of problems ensued
and the reforming impetus withered. Many critics blamed a downturn in the economy in 1937 on
Roosevelt’s desire to balance the budget. It had coincided with a rapid reduction in the WPA’s expendi-
ture and was consequently dubbed the ‘Roosevelt Recession’. Unemployment had risen by four million
before Roosevelt requested more funding for relief programmes.
Further discontent followed with his attempt to reorganise the workings of the White House. The
Executive Office of the President was eventually created in 1939, much to the chagrin of Congress. The mid-
term elections of 1938 saw the failure of an attempted purge of Democratic Conservatives by Roosevelt and
the Republicans made modest gains in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. The wind had
been taken from the sails of domestic policy and the New Deal was over. At the same time events in Europe
and the Pacific began to loom ominously on the horizon. By the end of the New Deal, America had not yet
risen from the ashes of its spectacular economic collapse, beginning almost a decade before. Massive arms
sales to Britain and its own entry into the war finally brought a long awaited recovery to the US.
Today historians contest the nature of the New Deal and its impact on America. The weaknesses of
various pieces of legislation are easy to identify and the absence of an economic recovery in the 1930s all
too obvious. Some regard the period as a missed opportunity for more radical change and highlight the
conservatism of many reforms. However, this runs the risk of misinterpreting Roosevelt’s aims and down-
playing the significance of the New Deal. The achievements of both are concrete enough and the steps taken
resulted in the strengthening of the American systems of democracy and capitalism. He had told America
at his first inauguration in March 1933: ‘This great nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and
will prosper.’ It did, and Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal had played their parts.
ESSAYS • 165
1111
Part 2: Essays
2111
3
4111 The policies of the New Deal
5
6 1 How effective were New Deal reforms of the banking and financial sectors in achieving
7 their aims? (20)
8 (AQA)
9
10111 Financial reforms were an integral part of the New Deal. They were required to set the institutions of US
1 capital on a firmer footing and to prevent a repeat of mistakes made during the 1920s, which had been
2 largely responsible for the spectacular stock market collapse. Consequently, throughout the years of the
3 New Deal, Roosevelt’s administration made several notable changes to America’s financial systems.
4 The immediate priority was to take action to halt the alarming rate of closure of the nation’s banks.
5 The system appeared to be on the verge of collapse with bank after bank closing as people rushed to with-
6 draw their savings. A ‘bank holiday’ was declared in order to providing breathing space as FDR and his
7 team considered their options. A mere five days after the inauguration, the Emergency Banking Bill sailed
8 through a specially reconvened Congress. Solvent banks were to be backed by the federal government,
9 which itself extended its powers to control the banking system, whereas the weakest banks were not allowed
20111 to reopen.
1 Roosevelt addressed the nation on the radio three days later in the first of his ‘fireside chats’. In his
2 confident yet friendly manner he assured Americans that their savings were now safe. He went on to explain
3 the reforms and ask for the people’s help in rectifying the situation. The run on the banks quickly halted as
4 people deposited their savings just as their President had requested. The banking system had been stabilised
5 in a matter of days. So how had FDR accomplished this? After all the proposals were hardly new – by and
6 large they had been adopted from Hoover’s administration. Roosevelt had simply introduced a balanced
7 measure that was enough to convince the people without alarming the business community. The unequiv-
8 ocal success of this first piece of New Deal legislation also illustrates the faith that FDR was able to inspire
9 among the American people. It is difficult to imagine Hoover being successful with a similar ploy.
30 There were two other notable forays into banking reform for the New Deal. The Glass-Steagall Act,
1 which was passed on FDR’s 100th day in office, was designed to prevent a recurrence of some of the prob-
2 lems of the 1920s by, for example, banning stock market speculation by commercial banks. Furthermore,
3 it insured bank deposits of up to $2,500 for individual investors. This Act can also be considered successful
4 in achieving its goals as, together with the Emergency Banking Relief Act, it restored confidence in US
5 banking. Just three months earlier that same banking system had been close to a collapse. During the Second
6 New Deal the Banking Act of August 1935 effectively gave the federal government control over banking.
7 The Federal Reserve Board was revamped and given responsibility for certain decisions such as setting the
8 bank rate and the appointment of key personnel. In effect the US now had a central banking system
9 that would be run from Washington DC.
40 It was felt that Wall Street also needed to be reformed. The Securities Act of 1933 stipulated that
1 realistic information must be given to investors on share issues. This was intended to remove the threat
2 of wild over-speculation in the stock markets, which had contributed to the Wall Street crash. The
3 Securities Act of 1934 set up the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under Joseph P. Kennedy:
4 this acted as a scrutiniser of Wall Street and proved to be effective at its job. The measure helped Wall
45 Street regain some credibility – as well as helping FDR’s administration earn a totally unwarranted anti-
46 business reputation.
47 Other financial measures included taking the US off the gold standard in April 1933. Freeing the US
48 from international constraints regarding the value of the dollar would make it easier to manipulate its level.
49222 FDR’s actions had the effect of devaluing the US dollar and undoubtedly were contributory factors behind
a modest increase in prices. The price to pay for this was the wrecking of the International Economic
Conference in London in July 1933. The US was taking an isolationist stance in its efforts to climb out of
the Depression and neglecting its responsibilities to its trading partners.
These financial reforms removed a number of problems, which had become all too apparent in the
1920s when boom had led to bust. As a result banking was rescued and the stock exchanges re-acquired
some much needed credibility. Roosevelt had not taken any particularly radical steps and was criticised by
some who wished him to go further and, for example, nationalise the banks. In fact he relied upon advice
from the banking sector when proposals were being drafted. This indicates that his aim was to preserve the
existing system by removing its flaws rather than to fundamentally change it. Therefore the reforms should
be seen as a success given that they encouraged a restoration of confidence in the banking and financial
systems of the US. They were not intended to bring about an economic recovery from the depths of the
Depression in which the US was languishing. Direct intervention in industry and agriculture were required
for that task.
2 (a) Explain the motives behind the passage of the National Industrial Recovery Act. (7)
(b) Why was there so much opposition to NIRA? (18)

(Edexcel)
The National Industrial Recovery Act, passed on 16 June 1933, was the centrepiece of Roosevelt’s first
frantic period of legislating known as the ‘Hundred Days’. It is seen as a pro-business reform with important
concessions given to labour. The Act consisted of two parts. Firstly, the National Recovery Administration
(NRA) was intended to promote industrial recovery through the restructuring of business relations via a
series of regulatory codes. These codes of conduct were at the heart of NIRA. There were to be separate
codes for each industry that regulated competition, wages and conditions, and workers were guaranteed
the right to have input into them. They therefore introduced a cooperative relationship between companies
by the removal of the destructive practice of competitive pricing. With prices maintained or increased,
business could produce a profit, which would then be reinvested. The second element was the establish-
ment of the Public Works Administration, which would provide work through construction programmes
and consequently increase consumer purchasing power. The aim of both parts was to provide a much
needed shot in the arm for the beleaguered American economy. An examination of the inspiration behind
and the intentions of those who drafted the legislation will shed light on why it was passed.
Stabilising banking and the other financial reforms had been necessary but would not result in
increasing employment. Direct action was needed and Roosevelt’s administration was coming under pres-
sure from Congress, which had its own plans to affect a recovery. Action had to be taken quickly therefore
to pre-empt Congressional moves. Added to this pressure were the voices of advisers from within Roosevelt’s
‘Brains Trust’. Several notable New Deal advisers were among those who blamed competition between busi-
nesses for the Depression. One of the main provisions of the resulting Act therefore ensured anti-trust laws
were to be overlooked if industry implemented other codes. The codes would benefit business by regu-
lating prices as well as workers through agreements on wages and conditions. The scrapping of the anti-trust
laws removed a perceived obstacle to industrial expansion. This was a change that had been pushed for by
several business leaders since the early 1920s and had found fresh impetus after the head of General Electric,
Gerard Swope, proposed a similar move to prompt recovery in 1931.
Historians of the left, for example Radosh, have pointed out that the NRA had a strong corporate
background and was passed in the interests of business. He claims the conservative origins of the reforms
were camouflaged to a degree by the inclusion of seemingly radical measures. One of these measures was
Title II of NIRA, which set up a Public Works Administration. Public construction programmes were appro-
priated $3.3 billion over two years to relieve unemployment and economic stagnation. Although the Public
ESSAYS • 167
1111 Works Administration was part of NIRA, it was separated and handed to the conscientious Harold Ickes
2111 to run. It pumped money into worthwhile projects and in turn it was hoped that the economy would
3 benefit, as workers saw their purchasing power increase and once more became consumers.
4111 From the perspective of the left the PWA was launched for other than philanthropic purposes. ‘To the
5 hungry and unemployed, it symbolised a direct concern by the government for their plight. Its effects
6 were limited and it did not interfere with private business prerogatives’ (Radosh). From this standpoint
7 the PWA was little more than a sop to the people to disguise the pro-business measure from which it was
8 derived.
9 The part of NIRA that is most often focused upon is Section 7(a), which allowed workers to freely
10111 organise into unions. Radical critics of the New Deal claim that Section 7(a) was also a concession to labour
1 in return for the acceptance of the codes of conduct that allowed business to regulate itself. Furthermore,
2 it was conceptualised as being in the long-term interests of business anyway. Unionisation was a way for
3 business to institutionalise their conflict with labour within the existing corporate system, thus forestalling
4 the development of any more serious opposition. In 1926 the leading moderate, Gerard Swope, had tried
5 to convince other industrialists of the need for unionisation, explaining that the outcome would be ‘the
6 difference between an organisation with which we could work on a businesslike basis and one that would
7 be a source of endless difficulties’ (Radosh).
8 However this can be seen as an overly cynical view of the NRA and its codes. The historian Anthony
9 Badger has written that the impetus for business self-regulation came from smaller companies who stood
20111 to gain more than big business through the reduction in competition. Some labour leaders too had been
1 supportive of such measures, seeing the destructive effects of competition as a danger to jobs within their
2 industries. The inspiration behind Section 7(a) had actually come from the United Mine Workers, which
3 had proposed the acceptance of codes of self-regulation in their industry in return for guaranteed rights of
4 collective bargaining (Badger). The apportionment of influence behind the legislation can be debated but
5 it is undisputable that the aim of NIRA was to promote economic recovery.
6
7 (b) The National Recovery Administration Act was vast in its scope, incorporating hastily drawn up codes
8 of conduct for many different industries and $3.3 billion of funding for a Public Works Administration.
9 The aim was to promote industrial recovery. There were differing views about the best way to achieve this
30 goal and so it is no surprise to find that the Act provoked criticism. The most contentious opposition came
1 from small businesses, larger industries and organised labour. This central piece of the First New Deal,
2 which had attempted to please all, ended up pleasing no one during its two-year lifespan.
3 Many small firms felt aggrieved that the process of writing the codes of conduct was dominated by
4 big business. Government officials commonly left industries to draw up the codes themselves due to a lack
5 of knowledge and time. The resulting codes did not significantly aid economic recovery but it was felt
6 they had resulted in tilting the playing field even more in the favour of big business. Codes covering restric-
7 tions on levels of production together with the overlooking of anti-trust measures were a licence for larger
8 corporations to operate the NRA to their own advantage at the expense of smaller companies, which were
9 squeezed out (Badger). Opposition also came from several senators who supported the position of the small
40 businessman. They were against the suspension of anti-trust legislation and wished to see the full restoration
1 of market conditions.
2 NIRA was responsible for the alienation of the traditional business community from Roosevelt’s admin-
3 istration by early 1934. This appears odd, as the Act had given business the power to regulate itself.
4 But the rich resented government-imposed reform of an economy that they were used to running. Big
45 business resented the concessions that they had to make to labour, with the exception of some of the more
46 far-sighted employers who saw that it was in their benefit to have more stable relations (Brogan). A prime
47 example of opposition to NIRA was Henry Ford, who objected to the automobile code’s intrusion and
48 refused to sign up (though he did follow its hours and wages provisions). The sheer volume of the codes
49222 and the related bureaucracy confirmed business in its disdain for NIRA. As Badger has pointed out, it was
a test case sponsored by US Steel that brought the NRA codes down in 1935 in Schechter Poultry Co. v.
The United States.
As well as causing consternation among employers, employees were not content with the NRA either.
Organised labour felt let down because they did not receive enough protection under Section 7(a) of NIRA.
It ultimately lacked a way of being enforced properly and therefore proved to be of little value to organ-
ised labour. Senator Robert Wagner of New York was prominent in highlighting the problem. He introduced
what became the National Labor Relations Act in 1935 in response to the inadequacy of Section 7(a), which
incidentally he had helped to draft. He said it had had limited success, leading mostly to the formation
of ‘sham unions’ dominated by employers (Polenberg). It was his Act two years later, not NIRA, which
would finally ensure workers the freedom to form effective unions. Wagner also pointed to the inability of
the National Labor Relations Board, set up in August 1933 to oversee disputes, to enforce its decisions and
he sought to strengthen the Board as part of his bill. The codes had few friends, but despite their numerous
shortcomings they had brought some benefits including the abolition of child labour and sweatshops, and
the introduction of hours and wages agreements.
The Public Works Administration was spared the opposition that the NRA had attracted. It was a well
run and creative agency responsible for the building of countless bridges, dams, highways and public build-
ings. It was good for the construction industry but ultimately was not substantial enough to spark economic
recovery. Furthermore, funds were allocated slowly as its diligent head, Harold Ickes, endeavoured to fund
only useful projects. Roosevelt himself remained unconvinced about the wisdom of a government spending
its way out of recession. This helps explain why the actual investment in the PWA was under a third of
the figure that some politicians had suggested was necessary to make a real impact. The PWA may have
created many jobs but failed to bring a recovery and so did little to counter the criticisms of NIRA.
It was the regulatory side of NIRA that attracted most criticism, which came from all sides and for
widely differing reasons. The recovery that NIRA had promised was not forthcoming, arguably illustrating
the belief that politicians cannot command and conquer the economy, unlike other policy areas. The NRA
helped in reducing unemployment to 14 per cent and did promote a small amount of growth but such was
the extent of opposition that it was almost a relief for all concerned when the Supreme Court found the
codes unconstitutional.
PRACTICE QUESTION
3 To what extent did the New Deal fail to solve the problems of rural America in
the 1930s? (20)
(AQA)
4 (a) To what extent is the claim that the New Deal failed African Americans a valid
assertion? (7)
(b) How successful were the steps taken to provide for the destitute? (18)
(Edexcel)
(a) The answer commonly given is that Roosevelt’s administration took little, if any, action that would
improve life for the most disadvantaged groups in America, and unfortunately they were the ones who
needed help the most. Blacks were affected terribly by the Depression; they were usually the first workers
to be laid off and the last to be hired. Poor whites took over jobs traditionally done by blacks forcing even
more into further depths of poverty.
The reforms of the New Deal that were designed to give help to people directly were overwhelmingly
aimed at white men, to the detriment of ethnic minorities. Welfare programmes marginalised blacks and
sometimes neglected them totally. For example, the 1935 Social Security Act did not cover farm labourers
ESSAYS • 169
1111 and servants, both jobs in which many blacks worked. Furthermore, the New Deal spurned the oppor-
2111 tunity to pass civil rights laws. In fact, Roosevelt refused to lend his support to an anti-lynching bill in 1934
3 and the NRA codes permitted unequal wages. This could indicate that he was not in favour of advancing
4111 the position of African Americans.
5 But it was political realities rather than a lack of ideals that most probably prevented action. Roosevelt
6 was extremely reluctant to offend Southern Democrats, who had thus far been loyal supporters. The South
7 was a conservative region with social relationships that had changed little since the time of Reconstruction.
8 Roosevelt knew that any threat to Southern culture would be resented and could well signal the end of his
9 ‘New Deal coalition’, which was needed to get reforms through Congress. Rather than jeopardise the New
10111 Deal the administration consequently paid scant attention to the plight of blacks.
1 This view, that goes some way to exonerating the administration, is supported by several significant
2 gestures that signalled the slow advancement of black people. An unprecedented number of blacks were
3 employed within Roosevelt’s administration, which virtually eliminates claims of racial hostility. Leading
4 ‘New Dealers’ Harry Hopkins and Harold Ickes strove to ensure that blacks were not excluded from relief
5 programmes; and black men and Hispanic people were allowed onto CCC and WPA schemes. However
6 there was prejudice in the allocation of work and in the provision of dole, where it was not uncommon
7 for blacks to receive substantially less than whites. And, above all, there was the extraordinary First Lady,
8 Eleanor Roosevelt. She had a high profile and used it to campaign publicly for greater racial equality.
9 Blacks benefited from the drives to unionise, which were a product of the New Deal era, and from
20111 demographic shifts as more moved northwards and into the cities where they had more chance of being
1
able to vote. The black vote, where it existed, overwhelmingly switched allegiance from Republican to
2
Democrat, the obvious inference being that they saw Roosevelt as a friend to their race. Although the issue
3
of race had been largely ignored there was an unintended consequence on the civil rights issue. The federal
4
government had shown itself willing and able to intervene in hitherto untouched areas of American life for
5
the benefit of the disadvantaged. The example set during the 1930s gave hope as black leaders began to
6
believe that governmental action on race relations was a possibility for the future.
7
8
(b) With industrial production halved and an estimated quarter of the workforce out of work, vast numbers
9
of families were in a dire situation. There was no direct assistance available from the state for the unem-
30
1 ployed. President Hoover had maintained that providing relief was the business of charities and at best
2 state and local governments. Meagre charity payments of around $2 per week were grossly inadequate for
3 a family’s needs and indeed were non-existent in many rural areas. For millions the early 1930s was a time
4 of vagrancy, migration, scavenging, breadlines and malnutrition. Roosevelt shared Hoover’s concern with
5 balancing the federal budget, but was prepared to intervene on a much wider scale than his predecessor,
6 even though Hoover had gone further than his own predecessors would have done. New Deal reforms
7 aimed to provide a safety net for the destitute until economic recovery brought full employment.
8 The FERA represented a significant break with the past as the federal government assumed the respon-
9 sibility of providing the unemployed with dole. Because there was not the capacity in the federal bureaucracy
40 to deal with the administration of relief on such a large scale, the government had to rely on state appa-
1 ratus. There was a certain degree of enmity between the two levels of government, notably in parts of the
2 mid-west and the South. Governors strove to balance state budgets and ‘reliefers’ were often regarded as
3 scroungers. Consequently, there were problems in setting the level of dole and ensuring it was distributed.
4 The head of FERA, Harry Hopkins, may have spent an impressive $5 million in the first two hours of busi-
45 ness but the amounts given by FERA were inadequate when compared to normal working wages.
46 Furthermore, FERA helped the unemployed but it overlooked those whose hours and wages had been
47 reduced, who were also suffering the effects of the Depression. While noting that FERA was less than perfect
48 it is more important to acknowledge the precedent that had been set and to admire the will to provide for
49222 the destitute in times of great need.
Reform of a long-term nature came in the summer of 1935 in the Second New Deal when the land-
mark Social Security Act was passed. It made provisions for pensions and unemployment benefit based
fully on contributions from both employees and employers. Roosevelt was arguably convinced of the need
for such a measure in the wake of the widespread popularity of alternative schemes being proposed by
others. It was not without its problems, however. Certain groups were excluded from the scheme and the
amounts to be paid were modest. The most notable omission was health insurance. This put the US system
at odds with similar schemes being developed in Europe and consequently bequeathed to the future an
issue the country still wrestles with today. The President was simply not interested in implementing a health
insurance scheme. It has been argued that this was because he did not want to antagonise conservative
critics and the influential American Medical Association, which was against such a measure. This issue
notwithstanding, Roosevelt was proud of the Social Security Act of 1935. It represented the foundation of
the American welfare state and was something that could be built upon by future administrations.
Nevertheless, an inclusive health care system, national in scope and funded through taxation, is commonly
regarded as an integral element of an advanced industrialised nation. The case against Roosevelt is that the
failure of the US to reach this pinnacle of nationhood is due to his failure to seize the initiative when the
opportunity presented itself.
Valiant attempts to provide work were devised by the federal government throughout the decade. Work
relief had less stigma attached to it than collecting relief payments and helped restore self-pride for the
millions involved. Despite critics’ jibes of creating merely ‘leaf-raking’ jobs the ‘alphabet agencies’ irrefutably
undertook many useful projects. The Civilian Conservation Corps provided emergency employment mainly,
though not exclusively, for young white men. It eventually employed 2.5 million men on a temporary basis.
The Public Works Administration (itself an offshoot of the National Recovery Administration) helped the
construction industry and attempted to stimulate the economy through the building of schools, dams,
bridges and other public projects with a $3.3 billion budget. The Civil Works Administration generously
gave $400 million of PWA money in emergency relief to the unemployed during the harsh winter of 1933/4
before being dissolved in March 1934. The plethora of agencies and the overlap of their remits is a reflec-
tion of the haphazard nature of the First New Deal and illustrates a hurriedness that was born out of a
genuine concern for people’s plight.
During the Second New Deal in 1935 the relief programme was consolidated with the Social Security
Act and a new public works scheme. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) built ambitiously upon
earlier efforts at providing work relief. Roosevelt personally favoured this move away from direct relief
to work relief and requested $4.8 billion from Congress. It eventually kept an average of 2.1 million
men in employment during its eight-year life in the construction of public projects such as schools and
bridges.
Its funding was limited and consequently it could never hope to provide work for all those who needed
it. Nevertheless it made a significant contribution to improving the lives of millions of families as well as
transforming the infrastructure of cities and towns. The agency had a wide-ranging scope, even going so
far as to create work for unemployed musicians and actors through ventures like the Federal Theater Project.
Roosevelt, who had grown increasingly convinced of the need to balance the federal budget, significantly
reduced WPA spending in 1937. It was expanded once more in 1938 in response to a severe economic
downturn. This decision to reawaken work relief programmes in the face of renewed economic problems
illustrates that they were considered to have a positive impact upon the economy and in providing a level
of relief to the destitute.
Further to providing relief through work and the dole, the New Deal also gave aid to families and
farmers in order that they could retain their homes and farms. The Home Owners’ Loan Corporation estab-
lished in June 1933 had refinanced over one million mortgages by the end of FDR’s first term. The Federal
Housing Administration (FHA) of 1934 helped both the construction industry and middle-class families
by insuring mortgages. This led to the growth of suburban housing, but neglected the poor in the inner
cities. When compared to intervention by European governments, New Deal housing reforms appear pitiful.
ESSAYS • 171
1111 But such criticism needs to be considered alongside an understanding of the differing histories and values
2111 in the new world and the old. Farmers received assistance through a variety of measures. The Farm Credit
3 Administration provided much needed mortgage relief and the Frazier-Lemke Farm Mortgage Act of June
4111 1933 enabled some to regain land they had lost through foreclosure. Efforts such as these were successful
5 to an extent in their aims: 75 per cent of farmers retained their land and continued to farm. However this
6 still left one in four dispossessed and out of work.
7 When viewed from a European perspective, the American system of welfare that was introduced appears
8 limited in its scope. The New Deal has been criticised for failing to introduce more far-reaching reforms
9 at a time when there was scope for a lot more to be done. However, it is important to bear in mind the
10111 greater emphasis placed upon individualism in America, and thus recognise the clear break with the past
1 that occurred as the state took some degree of responsibility for the destitute. The ‘alphabet agencies’ were
2 a noble endeavour and were quite bold in their intent, especially if one considers the efforts made to support
3 artists and the emphasis on conservation. And, while acknowledging the faults of the welfare state, credit
4 should be given where it is due for the willingness to take the first step.
5
6
7 PRACTICE QUESTION
8 5 To what extent can the First New Deal be regarded as a failure in dealing with the effects
9 of the Depression? (20)
20111 (AQA)
1
2
3
Problems for the New Deal
4
5
6 (a) How effective was right-wing opposition to the New Deal? (7)
6
7 (b) Assess the impact of left-wing and populist critics of the New Deal. (18)
8 (Edexcel)
9
30 (a) It is commonly claimed that left-wing critics were of greater concern to Roosevelt than those of the
1 right. But while the left succeeded in capturing the imagination of millions throughout America, it was a
2 conservative coalition that reined in the New Deal as the 1930s drew to a close.
3 Initially Roosevelt enjoyed widespread support from both sides of the ideological spectrum during the
4 passage of the First New Deal. Farming and business benefited from legislation that propped up prices and
5 stimulated the economy, and therefore raised few objections to the measures introduced. Republicans in
6 Congress, outnumbered by 311 to 116 in the House of Representatives and by 60 to 35 in the Senate, could
7 provide little more than token resistance at best. In fact one sector of the party, the progressive wing, stood
8 fully behind the President on the majority of early New Deal legislation.
9 This climate of cooperation changed in 1934 as the impact of the first wave of reforms was felt. Farmers
40 remained individualist in nature, despite benefiting immensely from government credit and price fixing.
1 They objected vociferously to measures that helped the urban poor as the New Deal entered its second
2 phase. Opposition from agricultural regions was to have political ramifications later on as representatives
3 from these areas, many of them Democrat, turned their backs on Roosevelt.
4 Opposition from business was even more explicit. The business community overwhelmingly believed
45 in limited government and objected to what they saw as interference from Washington DC. Their loathing
46 of Roosevelt probably owed more to these instincts than to a rational analysis of political and economic
47 realities and the content of the New Deal legislation. There can be no doubt that many of the steps
48 taken by the administration were to the benefit of business. Banking had been rescued, Wall Street had
49222 been cleansed and NIRA had allowed big business to draw up codes to regulate themselves. The Acts that
introduced responsible unionism were intended to stabilise industrial relations and were accepted by some
of the more far-sighted as an inevitable progression. By 1935 however, many businessmen were hostile to
the New Deal.
A group of wealthy business leaders and conservatives from both parties formed the American Liberty
League in August 1934. Individually they had supported the early New Deal reforms but they were soon
united in their claims that Roosevelt and his radical advisers were anti-business. The League’s aims, as
stated in a nationwide radio address by its President, were to save the American system of government,
which the New Deal had ‘sought to destroy’ and to resist Roosevelt’s attempts to set up a ‘totalitarian
government’. For all their money and vitriolic rhetoric, the American Liberty League was only able to enlist
125,000 members. In comparison to the numbers attracted to more populist movements on the left, the
American Liberty League was not significant. For Roosevelt it proved to be more of an irritation than a
real worry.
It was in Congress itself where conservative opposition finally made headway. After a poor campaign
for the White House in 1936, the Republicans closed ranks in their opposition to the increase in power of
the federal government and Roosevelt’s clumsy proposal to reform the Supreme Court. The party moved
rightwards and fared better in the 1938 mid-terms gaining eight seats in the Senate and 80 more in the
House. They found common ground amongs Southern Democrats, who were extremely wary of the impact
that the New Deal might have on the Southern way of life. It was a wish to defend tradition that brought
them together in opposition to Roosevelt. This bipartisan alliance was very powerful on key Congressional
committees and in vetoing legislation from 1938 onwards. It proved very effective in stymieing domestic
reforms and helped shape US politics for the next 50 years.
(b) By the end of 1934 there had been a partial recovery from the depths of the Great Depression. Farm
prices were stabilised, falling industrial production had been halted and millions throughout the nation
had been helped by the myriad of ‘alphabet agencies’ that Roosevelt’s administration had established. But
11 million people were still unemployed and millions more, including the elderly and agricultural labourers,
felt overlooked by New Deal legislation. Unsurprisingly interest groups sprang up, left-wing politics gained
more relevance and populist speakers with quick-fix solutions to the nation’s problems were able to attract
many a sympathetic ear. An examination of the left-wing critics of Roosevelt sheds light on the short-
comings of the New Deal and serves to illustrate the plight of millions of Americans during the mid-1930s.
It also reveals that, although Roosevelt was untouchable at the ballot box, it does not necessarily follow
that his critics had no influence whatsoever on public policy.
Communists and socialists suffered from a lack of support from workers as well as from the under-
cutting of their appeal by the reforms of the New Deal. The 1930s may have represented the heyday
of American communism in terms of the number of members but, as Anthony Badger has pointed out,
it should be noted that turnover was high and only a dedicated core remained members for any length of
time. Furthermore in terms of votes the left fared unimpressively, failing to eclipse the level of support
for Eugene Debs a generation before. Arguably the high water mark for the left in the 1930s came in 1934
when a known socialist, Upton Sinclair, managed to become the Democratic gubernatorial nominee in
California. His plan to ‘End Poverty in California’ (EPIC) using socialist remedies proved immensely
popular and he was only narrowly defeated following a Republican smear campaign that deliberately mis-
represented his aims and leanings.
Historians of the New Left, notably Howard Zinn, have highlighted grass-roots discontent across
America that resulted in a heightened sense of self-reliance and occasional violent clashes. People organ-
ised themselves to prevent evictions and to protect the rights of the unemployed. Miners in Pennsylvania
sold millions of tonnes of ‘bootleg’ coal and from 1934 to 1938 a wave of labour disputes, encompassing
new ‘sit down’ strikes, rocked the establishment. The lowest ebb of such activity was the ‘Memorial Day
Massacre’ in Chicago in 1937 when police fired into a picket line of steel workers killing ten people. Zinn
claims that the government moved towards giving unions legal status in order to channel workers’ energy
ESSAYS • 173
1111 into negotiations, union meetings and elections. While there is no doubt an element of truth in this, it
2111 would be an exaggeration to imply that communism posed a serious threat in the United States. Workers
3 remained loyal to Roosevelt – they did not want extremist solutions. The centre ground and the American
4111 ideals of freedom and individualism were simply too well entrenched. Roosevelt also proved to be immensely
5 popular with the poor, as evidenced by the thousands of grateful letters that found their way to the White
6 House each month.
7 More worrying for FDR and arguably more influential were the series of popular movements headed
8 by charismatic ‘demagogues’, which culminated in a third party challenge for the Presidency in 1936. These
9 populists had initially been supportive of Roosevelt but seized upon the shortcomings of the First New
10111 Deal from 1934 onwards. They offered seemingly simple remedies of dubious merit aimed right at the
1 heartland of America.
2 The Townsend Old Age Pension Plan quickly rose to national prominence in late 1934. Dr Francis
3 Townsend of California had a popular yet ludicrous panacea for the Great Depression. His idea was to give
4 everyone aged over sixty $200 a month if they retired from work and spent all the money before the next
5 instalment came along. This attracted half a million members into Townsend Clubs. In his thorough analysis
6 of the New Deal’s Social Security Act, first published in 1936, Paul Douglas pointed out that the arithmetic
7 behind Townsend’s plan was startling: it would require spending half the national income on pensions
8 alone. At the same time a plan for comprehensive unemployment insurance was also attracting support.
9 This left-wing proposal was introduced into Congress in 1934, and again in 1935, by a socialist Farmer-
20111 Labor Party congressman from Minnesota, Ernest Lundeen. It is impossible to consider Roosevelt’s own
1
Social Security Act, introduced in the Second New Deal, without the consideration that his restricted
2
measure was in part a response to the popularity of the more radical Townsend Plan and Lundeen Bill.
3
Public opinion was important to Roosevelt and he did pay attention to his critics, especially those with
4
mass appeal. With an audience of millions, radio priest Charles Coughlin preached his own economic
5
programme throughout the mid-1930s. Coughlin’s ideas lacked any depth and the man himself drifted into
6
anti-Semitism as his influence declined. Although Roosevelt did meet with Coughlin on occasion it was
7
only for the purpose of calming the turbulent priest. Coughlin and his National Union for Social Justice
8
had no discernible impact upon policies.
9
The greatest populist threat came in the form of Louisiana’s charismatic senator Huey Long. He had
30
1 an impressive record of reform in his state, which he ran in a dictatorial style. His public programmes had
2 brought many benefits to the infrastructure of Louisiana and to its people. Citing the grossly uneven distri-
3 bution of the nation’s wealth as the cause of the nation’s woes, he launched his Share Our Wealth scheme
4 in February 1934. Long’s proposal of using the tax system to redistribute wealth and bring the Depression
5 to an end had an oversimplified and irresistible quality. Coupled with his proven record and effective use
6 of radio, he built up a nationwide following of millions. A poll by the Democratic Party in 1935 estimated
7 that Long might receive 10 per cent of the vote if he stood as a third party candidate the following year.
8 This could deprive the Democrats of enough votes to allow the Republicans back into the White House.
9 Owing to his untimely death in September 1935 Long’s potential was to remain pure speculation. However,
40 the ‘Kingfish’ of Louisiana lived long enough to see his bitter opponent, Roosevelt, undermine him by
1 introducing a series of tax reforms in the Second New Deal. Roosevelt’s Revenue Act, which called for a
2 modest increase in income tax, was begrudgingly dismissed as a sell-out by Long.
3 The similarity in the timing and nature of Long’s plan and Roosevelt’s actions cannot be explained
4 away by coincidence. Historian Albert Fried has written that Roosevelt had not been greatly concerned
45 by Long’s embryonic election campaign. This may be an accurate assertion but it does not automatically
46 follow that left-wing critics made no impact. The popularity of such movements demonstrated to FDR
47 the size of the discontent across the nation, with people favouring a radicalisation of the New Deal.
48 This discontent was a significant factor behind the more socially democratic reforms of the Second New
49222 Deal as the pragmatic President moved to appropriate the liberal left.
7 (a) Why did Roosevelt attempt to ‘pack’ the Supreme Court in 1937? (45)
(b) Explain why FDR’s ‘Court-packing’ plan failed and assess the impact the controversy
had on the New Deal. (45)
(OCR)
(a) The most stubborn obstacle in the path of the New Deal was not Congress, which seemed content
with the enhanced role of the Presidency; rather it was the Supreme Court. One of the functions of this
body is to interpret and safeguard the US Constitution. The power of judicial review, that is the power of
the Court to declare actions of the other branches of government unconstitutional or indeed to confirm
constitutionality, was asserted in 1803. This power has been used sparingly except for in the mid-1930s
when a conservative-dominated Court struck down no fewer than 11 federal laws.
In retrospect it is little surprise that there was a rift between the executive and judiciary. The
programmes of the New Deal were important departures and saw the government enter hitherto uncharted
territory. The Court was bound to question the constitutionality of Acts of Congress that meddled in intra-
state commerce and allowed the federal government to regulate the economy. The Court had consistently
ruled that this was the domain of the individual states and not the federal government. One should bear
in mind the prominent role of the debate over states’ rights versus federal rights at Philadelphia in 1787
and in the ensuing ratification saga. The US Constitution had placed limitations upon the powers to be
wielded by the various actors in government. And here was Franklin Roosevelt pushing the boundaries of
that sacred document to its extremes.
Furthermore the make-up of the Court in the 1930s helps explain the sudden upsurge in judicial
review of acts of Congress. Chief Justice Hughes and four other conservatives (the ‘Four Horsemen of
Conservatism’) ensured that the Court remained stuck in the past. The laissez-faire attitude held by the
majority of the nine justices set the Supreme Court at odds with the other branches of government and
public opinion, which had clearly demonstrated a desire for legislative intervention for the common good.
So the ethos of the Court taken together with the nature of New Deal ensured a collision was nigh on
inevitable.
It was not long in coming. Two pieces of legislation crucial to the New Deal were struck down during
FDR’s first term in office. In May 1935 the Court unanimously declared the National Recovery Adminis-
tration unconstitutional. Schechter Poultry Co. v. The United States was a case concerning a firm of New
York butchers prosecuted for selling diseased meat. This was in contravention of an NRA code, which had
been regulating commerce and industry since 1933. The Schechter brothers appealed on the grounds that
the federal government had no right interfering in a matter of internal state trade. The Court concurred
stating that the NRA codes contravened Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution, which under the existing
interpretation allowed the federal government to regulate commerce between states but not within a state.
The Court also declared NIRA unconstitutional on the grounds that Congress had delegated too much
power to the executive without giving guidelines on the use of such powers. In other words, the US had
shifted from having a Congress-centred government towards a President-centred government and the
Supreme Court disapproved.
Presumably the Schechter brothers cared little who they were prosecuted by, be it the United States
or New York State. The ‘Sick Chicken’ case, as it became known, was anything but a trivial matter: in fact
it was a test case, financed by industry, in order to challenge the regulation of commerce brought in by the
New Deal. The following year saw the Agricultural Amendment Act struck down by a divided Court. United
States v. Butler concluded with a controversial decision resting on the constitutionality of certain taxation
laws. (Taxes had been raised from the food processing industry in order to provide subsidies to farmers
who agreed to limit their production.) These landmark cases, together with several lower profile ones struck
at the very heart of the New Deal. An angry Roosevelt knew he needed to deal with this obstacle before
pushing ahead with further reforms. Indeed the Court still had to rule on legislation from the Second New
Deal, thus imperilling the National Labor Relations Act and the Social Security Act.
ESSAYS • 175
1111 Roosevelt claimed, with considerable justification, that the Supreme Court was out of step with the
2111 rest of the nation. There had been no deaths or retirements on the Supreme Court during his first term
3 and so FDR had not had the opportunity to make any appointments of his own. He faced a Court that
4111 apparently cared little for public opinion and political realities. They were preventing him from doing things
5 that needed to be done and that he had been elected to do. The Court, for its part, felt that it was performing
6 its duty to safeguard America’s carefully crafted system of checks and balances.
7 Roosevelt’s mandate was renewed in the autumn of 1936 with an overwhelming victory that saw him
8 carry all the states in the Union except for Vermont and Maine. He made his move against the Court
9 shortly after his second inauguration (now in January following the passage of the 20th Amendment) when
10111 he presented his Judiciary Reorganisation Bill to Congress. For every judge over the age of 70, the President
1 wanted the power to appoint another in the name of efficiency. It was a blatant attempt to secure a more
2 sympathetic Court and unsurprisingly was criticised as merely a crude ‘Court-packing plan’. It was one
3 of most significant political miscalculations that Roosevelt made. The bill was defeated in the Senate by
4 70 votes to 20 after a shrewdly fought conservative campaign. The scale of Roosevelt’s error is brought
5 sharply into focus if one considers the apportionment of seats in the Senate. The Democrats had 76 to the
6 Republicans’ 16.
7 The President had presumably felt that introducing such a measure was the most effective way of
8 protecting reforms that were both needed and desired. The only other feasible way of constraining the
9 Supreme Court would have been through Constitutional amendment but this method would have required
20111 more time and greater support in order to succeed. Rather than alter the Constitution itself Roosevelt felt
1
it better to alter the body charged with interpreting the document.
2
A clash between the President and the judiciary was virtually unavoidable given the differing ethos
3
of the New Deal and the Supreme Court. However it should be noted that the build-up to the collision
4
had been many years in coming. The Court’s reactionary interpretation of the commerce clause of the
5
Constitution had been a point of friction between the two branches of government at various points
6
throughout preceding decades. The battle was long overdue by the time it finally arrived, brought on by
7
the federal government needing to become more interventionist in the face of the Great Depression.
8
9
(b) The defeat of the Judiciary Reorganisation Bill in July 1937 is considered to be a humiliation for
30
1 President Roosevelt. However the episode did yield some positive consequences for the administration.
2 Generally speaking, the controversy had a two-fold effect upon the New Deal. Firstly, it prompted the
3 Supreme Court to be more sympathetic to Roosevelt’s reforms and, secondly, it helped apply the brakes
4 to the most frenzied period of legislative activity the United States has ever seen.
5 There were several reasons why Roosevelt’s plan failed. Prominent among these was Roosevelt’s taking
6 Congress for granted. During his first term, Congress had shown itself more than willing to cooperate with
7 the President, content to pass his proposals with little debate. As time wore on and the emergency was
8 assumed to be under control, Congress became less amenable. In the Second New Deal, reforms on busi-
9 ness and income tax produced hesitation and dissent. Following the elections of 1936 the Democrats held
40 even larger majorities in both Houses. FDR assumed that after such an overwhelming vote of confidence
1 in himself and his administration’s policies Congress would continue to bend to his whim.
2 However, he unveiled his plan just days after he had taken Congress aback with his proposal to re-
3 organise and strengthen the running of the White House. Furthermore, Roosevelt had made his decision
4 on Court reform without consulting Congressional leaders. He displayed an overly presumptuous attitude
45 towards fellow Democrats in assuming that they would toe the party line. In the vast and diverse US, party
46 unity is somewhat looser than it is in a more homogenous, unitary state such as Britain. Congressional
47 opponents from both parties, buoyed by their worst suspicions of Roosevelt’s dictatorial ambitions
48 apparently gaining substance, formed the National Committee to Uphold Constitutional Government. It
49222 ran a shrewd campaign to persuade wavering senators to stand up to Roosevelt.
The President, fresh from electoral triumph, miscalculated the public’s mood too. Although he had
received 60.8 per cent of the vote only months earlier, he neglected to consider the strong affection that
Americans have for their institutions, including the Supreme Court. He could not carry the public with
him on this issue. It seemed a less urgent matter than agricultural subsidies or labour rights and appeared
as a blatant attack on the work of the Founding Fathers. Consequently Roosevelt received little support
from interest groups even though they would have benefited from the bill.
The justices themselves reacted wisely to the affront. The Chief Justice made a strong case against
Roosevelt’s claim that they were proving inefficient owing to old age. One of the conservatives announced
his retirement in May 1937 allowing Roosevelt his first Supreme Court nomination. But most tellingly of
all, the Court changed tack and began to uphold New Deal legislation when one of the five conservative
justices switched sides.
This occurred while the bill was still under debate and thus took away the impetus behind the reform.
This ‘switch in time that saved nine’ saw the Court uphold types of legislation that it had rejected only
weeks before. Crucially it upheld the National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act) and the Social Security
Act. It was no surprise when the Senate heavily defeated the Judiciary Reform Bill.
Roosevelt had lost the battle but it can be claimed that he won the wider war over the role of govern-
ment in the United States. The Supreme Court’s reinterpretation of the commerce clause gave powers to
the federal government that previously it could only wish for. Acts that concerned workers’ rights, the regu-
lation of the economy and the formation of a welfare state were now safe under the Constitution. It
represented a monumental breakthrough, dragging the national government into the modern age. This
fundamental change, all too often downplayed, was forced through by Franklin Roosevelt’s determination
to protect the New Deal. Unfortunately for him there was a price to be paid.
As mentioned above, emerging opposition in Congress was a significant factor behind the defeat. The
progressive wing of the Republican Party that had been sympathetic to FDR found itself reunited with more
conservative colleagues over the issue. Conservatively inclined Democrats joined them. Emboldened by
their victory over the popular President and having received renewed mandates from the people in 1938,
Roosevelt’s carte blanche from Congress was rescinded. The controversy served to strengthen existing scep-
ticism and opposition to Roosevelt, aided and abetted by a period of industrial unrest and renewed recession.
The compliance of Congress was now a thing of the past. It gave little away as the New Deal ground to a
halt and attention turned outward to the Pacific and Europe.
8 How supportive of the New Deal were the people and institutions of the United
States? (20)
(AQA)
Essay plan
Introduction: State that levels of support for the New Deal varied between different groups and changed
over time.
Para 1: Broadly speaking, Roosevelt enjoyed the consistent support of the vast majority of American citizens.
Election results and the thousands of letters that flooded the White House each week provide
evidence for this.
Para 2: Business and financial institutions were supportive during the ‘Hundred Days’ but this changed
as they began to view government regulation as a threat.
Para 3: Congress willingly gave its support to the First and Second New Deals but Republicans and some
Democrats effectively opposed FDR in the latter half of the 1930s.
ESSAYS • 177
1111
2111 Para 4: The Supreme Court proved to be the least supportive institution. Examine the make-up of the
3 Court and explain its switch in 1937.
4111 Para 5: An examination of groups that opposed the New Deal serves to illustrate the true level of support
5 it had. Outline criticisms from both left- and right-wing groups and individuals.
6
7 Conclusion: The people, and consequently their representatives in Congress, were largely supportive of the
8 measures taken to alleviate the effects of the Depression. A consistent source of opposition came
9 from conservative groups, business leaders and Republicans. Identify the common ground between
10111 their opinions and use this to show why the New Deal stands as one the most remarkable periods
1 of legislation in the US.
2
3
4
5
6
7 The results of the New Deal
8
9 9 (a) Why was there a Second New Deal in 1935? (7)
20111 (b) Did Roosevelt change direction in 1935? (18)
1 (Edexcel)
2
3
(a) The major legislating phase of the New Deal can be said to have lasted around 1,000 days, although
4
some commentators have proposed a six-year period for the New Deal (Brogan) and a ‘Third New Deal’
5
in 1938 has been suggested (Clements). Of these 1,000 days, two periods of intense activity stand out. The
6
initial ‘Hundred Days’ following Roosevelt’s inauguration in March 1933 saw the passage of 14 significant
7
pieces of legislation. The pace slackened after 16 June 1933, but important Acts concerning financial reforms
8
were passed in 1934. This period is usually spoken of as the First New Deal.
9
A ‘Second Hundred Days’ of frantic law-making arrived in spring 1935. At least seven major Acts were
30
passed during this period, usually termed the Second New Deal. Whether or not it represented a change
1
of direction for Roosevelt’s administration is open for debate. The very notion of a Second New Deal has
2
3 been played down by some who highlight the continuity with past measures and point out that several of
4 the reforms of 1935 had long been in preparation (Jones). But in terms of the number of important Acts
5 passed, it is appropriate to claim there was a renewed momentum to legislate in early 1935.
6 There were numerous reasons behind this. The continuing economic crisis was a significant factor in
7 prompting further action from the White House. Although unemployment had been reduced a little, the
8 hoped-for economic recovery had failed to materialise. Work relief measures were collated and extended
9 under the Works Progress Administration as it became clear that unemployment was going to be a long-
40 term problem. The business community had removed their support for the New Deal after the first year
1 and the President resented their perceived ingratitude towards his administration. Roosevelt was facing a
2 drawn-out struggle against the Depression as well as being the object of criticism from both left and right.
3 In this light it is hardly surprising that he kept Congress in session throughout the summer and demanded
4 they accept major pieces of legislation.
45 Political realities played a role in furthering the New Deal. The President was facing re-election in
46 autumn 1936, but the jostling for position begins many months earlier in the US. The increasing popu-
47 larity of radical demagogues augmented his will to act. Roosevelt’s modest increase in progressive taxation
48 was in part intended to forestall Huey Long’s crusade and the Social Security Act surely owes a modicum
49222 of debt to the appeal of the Townsend Plan.
The Supreme Court unwittingly added to the legislative impetus. Its invalidation of New Deal legisla-
tion necessitated the formulation of replacement measures. For example, the striking down of the National
Industrial Recovery Act prompted senator Wagner to introduce the National Labor Relations Bill. The
‘Wagner Act’ also owes a debt to the inadequacies of the initial Section 7(a) of NIRA and to the growing
demands of organised labour.
Pressure from within Congress is another factor to consider. The mid-term elections in 1934 had seen
gains made by liberals in both Houses. Senators Wagner and La Follette were to the fore of those demanding
action from the White House and from the legislature itself. Roosevelt had broken the convention of
Congress’s domination of proposing legislation with the First New Deal. He knew that if he failed to act,
they would.
(b) A second period of legislating began with the enlargement of work relief programmes in spring 1935.
The pace intensified during the summer, following the striking down of the NRA, and a raft of legislation
was passed, including a rise in income tax and the strengthening of the rights of trade unions. This Second
New Deal is commonly held to be more radical than its predecessor. In terms of timing it follows the break-
down of Roosevelt’s relations with the business and finance sector, which had for the most part turned
against the President by the end of his first year in office. In appearance the Second New Deal was certainly
more populist and less orientated to the demands of larger corporations. However, to state that there was
a change of direction in 1935 somewhat exaggerates the situation. An examination of the major laws that
were enacted at this time shows that there was in many respects a strong element of continuity between
the First and Second New Deal.
The Works Progress Administration was established under the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act of
April 1935. It consolidated and significantly extended work relief programmes that had been started during
the First New Deal. With an initial investment of $4.8 billion and a wide-ranging scope, including providing
work for many artists and young people, it represented the most substantial of all the ‘alphabet agencies’
for many millions of Americans. The WPA is best viewed as a natural progression from earlier efforts rather
than a radical departure. It was the ongoing economic depression that had made further action necessary
not a change in thinking. Work relief was not enough to increase demand sufficiently to produce a recovery,
but would continue to be pivotal in helping millions to endure the hard times.
The Social Security Act of August 1935 laid the basis for the American welfare state, for better or worse.
A federally administered system of pensions and a limited unemployment insurance scheme were estab-
lished. Both schemes were to be based on contributions from workers and employers. The Act also provided
assistance to those who were unable to work through no fault of their own, for example, people with injuries
or disabilities. The Act should not be considered a truly radical measure due to its limited scope and
the millions it excluded from coverage, but for its time and place it certainly represented a public-minded
reform.
The Revenue Act (or Wealth Tax Act) incorporated modest reforms of the taxation system. A progres-
sive income tax was introduced on large companies and the highest rate of personal income tax was increased
to 79 per cent. This would raise money to help pay for New Deal reforms and had the added bonus of
undermining the appeal of Huey Long and his Share Our Wealth campaign. Critics labelled it the ‘Soak-
the-Rich Act’ but it must be stated that the new taxes raised relatively modest amounts. A major
redistribution of the nation’s wealth was certainly not on Roosevelt’s agenda.
The Banking Act of August 1935 centralised the US banking system. The power the Presidency held
over key institutions in banking was significantly increased, as the Federal Reserve Board became the focal
point for monetary policy. Although conservatives saw it as an attack on the banking sector, the Act was
hardly a change of direction: in many ways it was a progression from earlier financial reforms. Further-
more, creating a centralised banking system was an overdue necessity rather than an attack on established
interests.
ESSAYS • 179
1111 The Public Utility Holding Company Act aimed to break up powerful monopolies in the energy sector.
2111 The provision of power had come to be dominated by a few gigantic companies that owned a myriad of
3 smaller companies. Roosevelt felt that the best way of dealing with these companies was simply to liquidate
4111 them. It signalled a return to trust-busting in an attempt to regulate the industry. This Act can be viewed
5 as a change of direction from the First New Deal, which had more or less encouraged larger companies to
6 engage in monopolistic practices under NIRA.
7 The National Labor Relations Act was designed to strengthen the rights of workers by guaranteeing
8 collective bargaining and strengthening the National Labor Relations Board, which was to oversee relations
9 between industry and unions. The Act is correctly regarded as one of the most prominent pieces of legislation
10111 from the New Deal era but its origins actually owed more to labour sympathisers in Congress than the
1 initially reluctant President. The ‘Wagner Act’ was a pro-labour reform and can therefore be viewed
2 as leaning towards the left of the political spectrum. However, it does not represent an abrupt change of
3 direction by Roosevelt. The Act was born out of the weaknesses of NIRA and NIRA’s invalidation by the
4 Supreme Court and is therefore better viewed as part of the ongoing process of stabilising business–labour
5 relations.
6 When taken en masse the legislation of the Second New Deal was more radical in the sense that it
7 overtly favoured the people and represented an end to conciliation with business. However it did not
8 represent a definite break with the past, as there were elements of consistency running from 1933 into 1935.
9 It is better to describe the Second New Deal as a change of emphasis as Roosevelt and his advisers sought
20111 to build upon the First New Deal by introducing more permanent reforms.
1
2
3 10 To what extent did the Second New Deal bring fundamental change to the US? (20)
4 (AQA)
5
6
Essay plan
7
8 Introduction: State why the legislation of the Second New Deal was deemed necessary in light of all the
9 measures passed in 1933. It can be ascertained that the Second New Deal was intended to bring
30 about more permanent reforms than the somewhat incoherent and reactive First New Deal.
1
Para 1: Examine the Wagner Act and show that it represents a more fundamental reform of labour rela-
2
tions than the moves made under NIRA.
3
4 Para 2: The Social Security Act certainly represents fundamental change but criticism can be offered as
5 health insurance was omitted. State that the federal government had already assumed responsi-
6 bility for the welfare of the people during 1933.
7
Para 3: The consolidation of work relief efforts under the WPA cannot be taken as a fundamental change
8
as it was intended to be ad hoc in nature. The TVA, however, did bring long-lasting change to
9
rural America.
40
1 Para 4: Examine the changes brought to the financial sector by the Banking Act.
2
Para 5: The scope and size of the federal government was greatly increased during the mid-1930s. The
3
creation of the Executive Office of the President illustrates this growth.
4
45 Conclusion: Acknowledge that left-wing historians have pointed to the conservative nature of some of FDR’s
46 reforms but the Second New Deal must be said to have fundamentally altered political, social and
47 economic realities.
48
49222
11 To what extent was the New Deal conservative? (20)

(AQA)
The New Deal aroused the contemporary opposition of conservatives, who felt it was too radical, as well
as the opposition of radicals, who felt it was too conservative. The benefit of hindsight has not resulted in
the ending of this debate, although a majority of historians would concur that one of Roosevelt’s primary
goals was to preserve and strengthen capitalism by reforming it. In the opinion of historians of the New
Left, for example Barton J. Bernstein and Howard Zinn, the New Deal had a minimal impact on the US.
They claim the reforms were meant to reaffirm the dominance of larger corporations and to forestall changes
of a more radical nature occurring. These historians have provided the most damning critique of the New
Deal and offered a significant insight into its conservative nature. However, their suggestions are tanta-
mount to saying that the New Deal was a cynical exercise in hoodwinking the public while reaffirming the
status of capitalism and have proved contentious as they overstate the radical will of the era and downplay
the significance of the changes made.
More recent analyses have challenged this ‘corporate liberal’ view and have, for example, highlighted
the extent of opposition to the New Deal from the very interests that are claimed to have been its intended
beneficiaries. However there remains a consensus that the essence of the New Deal was conservative. The
aim was not to challenge the capitalist system, rather to support it. But to simply describe the New Deal
as conservative is not enough. In what ways was it conservative? Could it have been more radical?
An examination of the New Deal does reveal a strong vein of conservatism running throughout. Many
pieces of legislation undoubtedly bolstered established interests: Wall Street, larger banks and giant corpo-
rations were strengthened and NIRA effectively allowed business to regulate itself. The AAA worked to the
advantage of larger farmers and did little for tenant farmers and labourers. The gains made by the average
person pale in comparison to those made by big business. There was no significant redistribution of wealth,
thus leaving one of the causes of the Depression intact. The provision of unemployment relief was welcome
but woefully insufficient. The welfare state that was established was essentially conservative, especially when
compared to those in other industrial nations. Many groups were omitted and the issue of health care was
avoided; and racial and gender discrimination went virtually unchecked. All of which serve to illustrate a
conservative social agenda.
This leads to the question why the New Deal was not more radical in nature. Firstly, Roosevelt himself
was not a radical. He was lukewarm at best on labour reform, seemingly indifferent towards health care
provision and reluctant to engage in civil rights matters. He can certainly be described as a fiscal conserv-
ative. It was only when faced with a dramatic downturn in the economy in 1937 following spending cuts
that Roosevelt finally chose to ignore the counsel of his more conservative advisers and revert to deficit
spending. Roosevelt’s conservative approach to spending led to his continuing hesitancy to fully embrace
the approach favoured by those influenced by the British economist Keynes. Many of the limitations of the
New Deal can be linked to this fiscal conservatism.
As well as self-imposed constraints, there were limitations placed on the ambitions of the New Deal
by external factors. The reforms themselves cannot be isolated from their context – they had to exist within
the realities of 1930s America. The administration lacked the apparatus and expertise that would have
been necessary in order to conceive and implement much more radical reforms. It is little surprise that the
New Deal relied upon businesses and farmers to regulate their own sectors: there was no other choice. The
federal government also had to take into account the power of the individual states and local officials
who were relied on to administer New Deal projects. Added to these considerations were the hurriedness
with which the administration had to act and the realities of working with conservatives in Congress. Lastly,
the American people did not want radical change – they wanted jobs and greater security within the existing
system. Taken in this light a pertinent question raises itself: could the New Deal have been more radical if
Roosevelt had wished it to be?
ESSAYS • 181
1111 The acknowledgement of the conservative ethos at the heart of the New Deal has led many critics
2111 to imply that little was achieved. Such a conclusion would be wrong: the New Deal undeniably had a great
3 impact upon the United States. The overall aim was to preserve the existing system, but, in doing so, many
4111 measures broke new ground, brought changes and aroused considerable opposition from conservatives.
5 The federal government’s authority to regulate and legislate was moved forward and the degree to which
6 it impacted upon the everyday lives of individuals increased significantly. The financial system was rescued
7 and stabilised and deficit spending was cautiously advanced. There was unprecedented movement towards
8 a limited welfare state with the introduction of relief programmes and social security. Workers were empow-
9 ered as ‘responsible’ trade unions were established and their voice came to be represented in a strengthened
10111 Democratic coalition. The infrastructure of the United States received unparalleled investment as public
1 works and electrification programmes transformed America. Can all these changes be the work of a conser-
2 vative administration?
3 Politically, socially and economically the New Deal clearly changed the US to a degree that no other
4 administration can claim to equal. Many changes alarmed conservatives and the business community and
5 brought significant gains to liberal causes. Roosevelt’s intent was to uphold the capitalist system and there-
6 fore to state that the overall objective was conservative is accurate. However, it has to be recognised that
7 there was neither the impetus nor the opportunity to demolish capitalism and the changes the New Deal
8 brought are better described as liberal, not conservative.
9
20111 12 To what extent was the New Deal successful in fulfilling its goals in the 1930s? (20)
1 (AQA)
2
3 By comparing the intended results of New Deal legislation to its actual results a measure of success can be
4 determined. The overall aims were to underwrite the systems of capital, finance and democracy and restore
5 people’s faith in them. The New Deal was a battle fought on many fronts as the sheer scale of the Depression
6 necessitated action across all areas of policy. Assessments of three broad areas – bringing economic recovery,
7 reforming America’s economic and social systems, and providing relief for the people – reveal the New
8 Deal to be at least a partial success, though its successes need to be qualified by reference to their short-
9 comings and the failure of the New Deal to bring economic recovery must be affirmed.
30 The National Industrial Recovery Act represented the major attempt of the New Deal to stimulate the
1 economy into recovery. But the National Recovery Administration pleased no one, not even the larger
2 corporations who came to dominate the code authorities. Badger has asserted: ‘The NRA only restored
3 modest profitability to American business, if it restored any at all’. It did not deliver what it had been
4 conceptualised for and can be regarded as an eminent New Deal failure.
5 NIRA’s spending programmes also proved inadequate to produce a full recovery. Roosevelt remained
6 unconvinced by Keynesian economic theory and was therefore reluctant to incur large spending deficits in
7 a ‘no-holds-barred’ attempt to promote recovery. The Public Works Administration and the later Works
8 Progress Administration were simply allocated too little to achieve this end. Yet it seems that this was no
9 surprise for the New Dealers, who had envisaged a full-scale recovery coming from renewed confidence in
40 the private sector rather than from massive public spending. Perhaps the best that can be said of NIRA’s
1 codes and programme of work relief is that they stopped the economic situation getting worse and laid the
2 foundation for a full recovery once demand significantly increased with the outbreak of war.
3 Agricultural reforms were intended to help fuel an increase in consumption and undoubtedly did
4 lead to the creation of jobs. Although the impact on the American economy was positive, again it was
45 not enough to prompt a full recovery from such depths. This does not mean that the administration’s
46 agricultural policies were a total failure. On the contrary, the problem of overproduction was quickly
47 solved and agricultural prices had doubled by 1937 (Brogan). New Deal policies were largely responsible
48 for the turnaround in fortunes but there are criticisms to bear in mind. The reforms tended to work in
49222 favour of larger farmers and rural poverty and discrimination persisted. However, the positives outweigh
the negatives and, as Alan Brinkley has written: ‘the agricultural economy as a whole emerged from the
1930s much more stable and prosperous than it had been in many years.’
The numerous banking and financial measures of the New Deal were largely successful in achieving
their aim of ridding the capitalist systems of a number of their worst excesses. Public confidence returned
and the nation was better protected from the possibility of a recurrence of the devastating collapse of the
stock markets and banks. Political reforms can also be judged a success, notwithstanding the defeat of the
Judiciary Reorganisation Bill. Roosevelt established the modern Presidency and made Washington DC a
true capital city.
The various relief programmes also deserve credit despite their many faults. When making an histor-
ical judgement it is important to consider events and actions in their full context. New Deal measures to
provide work and dole payments deserve to be considered in light of what had come before rather than
lamented as a missed opportunity to usher in more radical reforms. Furthermore, the limitations on
Roosevelt, such as a lack of state machinery to administer welfare payments, the system of federalism and
the speed in which he had to act, should be remembered when passing judgement. It is almost too easy to
criticise the shortcomings of the ‘alphabet agencies’ rather than to focus on their actual achievements. Their
contribution was to help millions of families struggle through until prosperity returned. Failure would have
been to let them suffer without spending billions in aid. The American people responded with genuine
affection for their President as well as with votes.
The electoral success of the New Deal can be safely judged overwhelming. Gaining re-election is some-
thing that typically comes to the fore in Presidential thinking and activity during the latter half of a first
term. The contemporary judgement from the millions who endured the Great Depression was unequiv-
ocal. The New Deal had helped them to cope in the most desperate of times. Roosevelt was easily returned
to power in 1936 in an election that was a virtual referendum on the New Deal. Franklin Roosevelt even-
tually won four Presidential elections (the 22nd Amendment was not passed until 1951) and occupied the
White House until his death on 12 April 1945.
Amid the successes and failures, judgement inevitably draws upon one’s opinions of the role of the
state in a modern industrialised nation. Notably the New Deal failed to bring economic recovery and by
1939 there remained nine million unemployed. But weighed against this apparent failure it should be borne
in mind that prior to FDR the federal government’s role in economic affairs was negligible by comparison,
a point which illustrates just how much had been achieved. Furthermore, bare facts can be presented in
differing ways. It can be said with equal truth that from 1933 to 1939 unemployment was halved, a period
in which the population increased by around eight million. To a significant extent it becomes a matter of
interpretation. Is the glass half full because unemployment was halved or half empty because full employ-
ment was not restored? When all is said and done, it would be appropriate to claim the New Deal a noble
endeavour and a partial success. It had transformed America and bequeathed many positive achievements
to the nation.
Part 3: Sources
1 The agricultural crisis
■ Source A: Henry A. Wallace (Secretary of Agriculture, 1933–40), extract from a speech

delivered by radio, 10 March 1933
The problem is clearly revealed. During the few years just preceding 1929, we were selling in foreign markets
the product of roughly sixty million acres of land. The value of those exports this past fiscal year was sixty
percent below that of 1929. We must reopen those markets, restore domestic markets, and bring about
rising prices generally; or we must provide an orderly retreat for the surplus acreage, or both.
SOURCES • 183
1111 For twelve years American agriculture has suffered, and suffered cruelly. This has been largely because the
2111 government could not, or would not, formulate the policies that would enable the United States to act as
3 a nation should which is owed money by other nations.
4111
5 ■ Source B: Extract from an address by Roosevelt to Farm Groups, 14 May 1935
6
7 . . . a plan for the adjustment of totals in our major crops, so that from year to year production and
8 consumption would be kept in reasonable balance with each other, to the end that reasonable prices would
9 be paid to farmers for their crops and unwieldy surpluses would not depress our markets and upset the
10111 balance. We are now at the beginning of the third year of carrying out this policy. You know the results
1 thus far attained. You know the present price of cotton, of wheat, of tobacco, of corn, of hogs and of other
2 ham products today. Further comment on the successful partial attainment of our objective up to this time
3 is unnecessary on my part. You know.
4
5 ■ Source C: Mr Justice Roberts delivered the opinion of the Court, United States v. Butler,
6 6 January 1936
7
8 . . . another principle embedded in our Constitution prohibits the enforcement of the Agricultural
9 Adjustment Act. The act invades the reserved rights of the states. It is a statutory plan to regulate and
20111 control agricultural production, a matter beyond the powers delegated to the federal government. The tax,
1 the appropriation of the funds raised, and the direction for their disbursement, are but parts of the plan.
2 They are but means to an unconstitutional end.
3
4 ■ Source D: Mr Justice Stone dissenting, United States v. Butler, 6 January 1936
5
6 . . . the only check upon our own exercise of power is our own sense of self-restraint. For the removal of
7 unwise laws from the statute books appeal lies, not to the courts, but to the ballot and to the processes of
8 democratic government. Of the assertion that the payments to farmers are coercive, it is enough to say that
9 no such contention is pressed by the taxpayer, and no such consequences were to be anticipated or appear
30 to have resulted from the administration of the act.
1
2
4
5
6
(a) Using Sources A and B and your own knowledge assess the impact of the First New Deal
7
on the agricultural crisis. (15)
8
9 (b) Using Sources C and D and your own knowledge explain why the Supreme Court struck
40 down the Agricultural Administration Act. (30)
1
2 (a) [Advice: You will have to use your wider knowledge to be able to assess if Roosevelt was justified in stating
3 that a partial though significant recovery was under way in the agricultural sector. It is important to examine
4 also the shortcomings of the First New Deal within rural communities.]
45
46 Less than a week after the inauguration Henry Wallace, the Secretary of Agriculture throughout the New
47 Deal, identified overproduction as the major problem facing US agriculture. The depression in both
48 foreign and domestic markets had exacerbated this problem. The net result of overproduction was falling
49222 prices. In Source A, Wallace states quite categorically that the reluctance of previous governments to
take appropriate action to remedy the situation had led to much suffering in the sector. He was thus
giving notice that the new administration was prepared to take an interventionist stance in response to
the crisis.
Reviving the fortunes of agriculture was clearly a priority during the early New Deal era. Indeed Roosevelt
and several of his advisers considered recovery in this sector vital to stimulating the economy as a whole.
With in excess of 40 per cent of the population living in rural areas it is not difficult to see why the New
Deal focused upon the agricultural economy from the outset. In Source B, Roosevelt, speaking in 1935 to a
group of farmers, claims that his administration’s policies had had a beneficial impact upon the agricultural
sector. The government had introduced production controls in order to solve the problem of overproduc-
tion. The effect of keeping production in balance with consumption was an increase in prices.
The medicine administered had not been easy to take. It involved reductions in farmed acreage and
the slaughter of livestock. This solution was skilfully administered by a system of self-regulation, with, for
example, farmers checking on other farmers’ fields. Subsidies helped them through this transition and, as
the President claims in the Source, prices certainly did increase as a result. It must be stated that for many
small farmers and agricultural labourers the New Deal was too little too late and that the government’s
task was aided by the drought and dust storms of 1934 and 1935. Countless thousands of families lost their
livelihoods and became migrants in search of work. Loans and mortgage aid did help to stem the tide to
a degree and together with the production controls of the AAA Roosevelt was justified in claiming a measure
of success by May 1935.
(b) [Advice: Both Sources C and D are from Supreme Court justices and concern the case United States v.
Butler, which resulted in a declaration that the AAA was incompatible with the Constitution. The views given
are the majority decision, which rules against the Act, and the dissenting view, which serves as a defence of it.
The wider context of the decision, namely the conservative nature of the Court, must be mentioned in order to
gain the higher grades.]
By the time it was declared unconstitutional, the AAA had significantly improved the lives of a proportion
of farmers. Prices had risen by over 60 per cent on average, which was a result of production controls plus
a severe drought that affected the South particularly badly. Farmers who owned the land they farmed gained
the most from the regulations that had been introduced, but the situation of tenant farmers and labourers
remained dire. As the Sources show, the Supreme Court struck down the Agricultural Adjustment Act with
the United States v. Butler decision in January 1936. There was a split between the conservative and liberal
elements in the Court, the former prevailing in a 6–3 decision. Sources C and D illustrate both viewpoints
and clearly show that there was a considerable gulf between the two.
A particular point of contention was a tax that had been levied on the food processing industry. It had
been necessary for the government to raise this tax so they could pay subsidies to farmers who had reduced
their production in order to facilitate price increases. In Source C, Mr Justice Roberts outlines the majority
opinion of the Supreme Court. He states that the federal government had encroached on the powers
of the individual states by assuming powers that had been guaranteed to the states in the Constitution.
He is saying that the federal government did not have the authority to regulate and control production as
the right to do this was not granted to the government specifically and therefore this right belonged to the
states. The production controls and the food processing tax were therefore an unconstitutional act on
the part of Congress, which had willingly passed this bill and numerous others that had emanated from
Roosevelt’s White House during the ‘Hundred Days’.
The Supreme Court was able to overturn the AAA and other reforms because it had an in-built conser-
vative majority. The justices, who are appointed by Presidents as and when there are vacancies, are not
unbiased actors on the political stage. They have their own beliefs and policy preferences and can and do
bring these to bear on public policy. Mr Justice Stone gives the minority opinion in Source D. He makes
an appeal for what he sees as common sense to prevail in the matter. In his dissent he puts the case that
SOURCES • 185
1111 the Supreme Court should endeavour to take into account the views of the people and those of the govern-
2111 ment that they have elected.
3 Mr Justice Stone paints an image of an unresponsive Court that was both out of touch with the people
4111 and modern economic realities. This concurred with the thoughts of many Democrats, including Roosevelt
5 himself. The President’s victory in 1932 had been emphatic enough and his landslide in 1936 served only
6 to reiterate and strengthen his mandate from the people. The message from the nation to Washington DC
7 could hardly have been clearer. Roosevelt had been elected to take action to rescue the country from its
8 plight and it appeared undemocratic that the partisan Supreme Court was willing to block the type of legis-
9 lation for which he had twice been given a resounding mandate.
10111 On the part of the justices, they felt that it was their task to uphold the Constitution and to give in
1 on the AAA would be to invite further transgressions by Congress against the work of the Founding Fathers.
2 But they had gone further than simply wishing to interpret the Constitution too literally. They were hand-
3 icapping the ability of the United States to recover from the Depression. The Founding Fathers had
4 bequeathed to the nation a brief (6,000 words) framework document that clearly invited future genera-
5 tions to fill in the details for themselves. The American economy had changed drastically from the time
6 when the US was a collection of thirteen largely rural seaboard states consisting of some 4 million people.
7 Its modern industrial economy required a degree of regulation from government, but the Supreme Court
8 stood in the way. In retrospect the Supreme Court had failed to change with the times. In all of American
9 history it has only very rarely gone against current public opinion for long; the 1930s being the classic
20111 example of an out-of-step Court.
1
2 ALTERNATIVE QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE
3
(a) Study Sources A and B. How did the Roosevelt administration attempt to solve the problem
4 of overproduction in the agricultural sector? (15)
5
6 (b) Using the Sources and your own knowledge explain why a collision between Roosevelt and
7 the Supreme Court was seemingly unavoidable. (30)
8
9
30 2 Views from within the administration
1
■ Source A: Roosevelt’s first inaugural address, March 1933
2
3 In such a spirit on my part and on yours we face our common difficulties. They concern, thank God, only
4 material things. Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen;
5 government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the
6 currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for
7 their produce; the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone.
8
9 More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great
40 number toil with little return. Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.
1 ■ Source B: Roosevelt’s State of the Union message, January 1935
2
3 We have undertaken a new order of things, yet we progress to it under the framework and in the spirit
4 and intent of the American Constitution. We have proceeded throughout the Nation a measurable distance
45 on the road toward this new order. Materially, I can report to you substantial benefits to our agricultural
46 population, increased industrial activity, and profits to our merchants. Of equal moment, there is evident
47 restoration of that spirit of confidence and faith which marks the American character. Let him who, for
48 speculative profit or partisan purpose, without just warrant would seek to disturb or dispel this assurance,
49222 take heed before he assumes responsibility for any which slows our onward steps.
■ Source C: Frances Perkins, national radio address delivered 25 February 1935
The process of recovery is not a simple one. We cannot be satisfied merely with makeshift arrangements
which will tide us over the present emergencies. We must devise plans that will not merely alleviate the ills
of today, but will prevent, as far as it is humanly possible to do so, their recurrence in the future. The task
of recovery is inseparable from the fundamental task of social reconstruction.
Our program deals with safeguards against unemployment, with old-age security, with maternal aid and
aid to crippled and dependent children and public health services. Another major subject, health insur-
ance, is dealt with briefly in the report of the Committee on Economic Security, but without any definite
recommendations.
■ Source D: Roosevelt’s second inaugural address, January 1937
But here is the challenge to our democracy. In this nation I see tens of millions of its citizens, a substan-
tial part of its whole population, who at this very moment are denied the greater part of what the very
lowest standards of today call the necessities of life. I see millions of families trying to live on incomes
so meagre that the pall of family disaster hangs over them day by day; I see millions whose daily lives in
city and on farm continue under conditions labelled indecent by a so-called polite society half a century
ago; I see millions denied education, recreation, and the opportunity to better their lot and the lot of their
children; I see millions lacking the means to buy the products of farm and factory and by their poverty
denying work and productiveness to many other millions; I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad,
ill-nourished.
It is not in despair that I paint you that picture. I paint it for you in hope because the Nation, seeing and
understanding the injustice in it, proposes to paint it out. We are determined to make every American
citizen the subject of his country’s interest and concern; and we will never regard any faithful law abiding
group within our borders as superfluous. The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abun-
dance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.
OCR QUESTION FORMAT
(a) Using Sources A and D assess if Roosevelt is acknowledging the failure of his first
administration in overcoming the dark realities of the Depression. (15)
(b) Using Sources A to D and your own knowledge explain the opposition that the New
Deal faced. (30)
(a) [Advice: FDR cited the problems he aimed to tackle at his first inauguration, including the issue of poverty,
and yet in 1937 the newly re-elected President highlighted enduring poverty in the US. However, rather than
being an admission of failure, FDR was probably more mindful of the growing criticisms of those on the right
and was therefore restating the importance of cooperation in his renewed appeal to the nation.]
On the surface Roosevelt’s second inaugural address appears to contain a tacit admission of failure. Problems
that are identified in Source A, namely the plight of farmers and the high level of unemployment, are
evident in Source D, which draws attention to enduring social problems in cities and on farms. Much
had been achieved but a real recovery remained beyond the horizon. Both Sources evoke vivid images
of suffering and Source D acknowledges their stubborn presence four years on from his first inaugural
SOURCES • 187
1111 address. However Roosevelt’s words do not contain any admission of shortcomings on his administration’s
2111 part. It is likely that Roosevelt’s intention was to draw attention to the scale of the task that remained and
3 garner support.
4111 Implicitly Roosevelt may well have been criticising the Supreme Court’s blocking of his administra-
5 tion’s attempts to tackle the problems of the Depression. The Court had declared major pieces of legislation
6 unconstitutional and seemed destined to continue its obstruction. In Source D both farming and industry
7 are specified as pressing concerns. The Court had struck down the NRA and the AAA, which were seen as
8 pivotal measures in the attempt to improve living standards and bring about economic recovery. Given
9 Roosevelt’s resounding success of 1936 and the nature of inaugural addresses, the President was spelling
10111 out the social conditions that he had an impressive mandate to improve.
1
2 (b) [Advice: The sources state the nature and size of the task facing Roosevelt’s administration in the 1930s.
3 Given the severity of the Depression and the watershed nature of the New Deal, opposition from various quar-
4 ters was to be expected.]
5
6 All four sources contain appeals from within the administration for support for the task of bringing relief,
7 recovery and reform to the United States. All Presidents require support from the people, Congress, Supreme
8 Court and business if they wish to successfully enact and execute major legislative initiatives. In the months
9 following Roosevelt’s first inauguration he was successful in commanding a reforming coalition ranging
20111 from business interests to the population as a whole. The ‘withered leaves of industrial enterprise’ and drop
1 in share values to which the President alluded were all too evident and it is understandable why FDR initially
2 enjoyed broad support.
3 Source B, taken from FDR’s 1935 State of the Union message, condemns business and Republicans,
4 including the Supreme Court, who were standing in the way of progress. During the course of 1934 a
5 proportion of the business community grew to resent the degree of control they were ceding to the govern-
6 ment. Such is the benefit of hindsight, it may be pointed out that they seemingly disregarded the inherent
7 conservatism of the New Deal. FDR was certainly more a friend of capitalism than a foe. Source D is from
8 1937, the year when FDR attempted to reform the Supreme Court due to its striking down of major New
9 Deal measures. By presenting himself as the champion of the needy, Roosevelt inferred that the Court was
30 the enemy of democracy, not his administration.
1 Source C is an explanation of the Social Security Bill of 1935 and provides an eloquent justification
2 for this fundamental measure. In her radio address, Frances Perkins acknowledged that health insurance
3 was a ‘major subject’ and was obviously under consideration by some in the administration, but the bill
4 that was drafted contained no attempt to introduce such a scheme. The President knew all too well that
5 he would face fierce opposition from private medical interests and his reluctance to act was pivotal in this
6 glaring omission of the New Deal.
7 The New Deal faced opposition from various quarters as the Sources imply. This opposition was
8 successful in reining in the New Deal and preventing it from going further than some in the administra-
9 tion would have liked. Unmentioned in the Sources are the voices of radicals who criticised the effectiveness
40 of the New Deal and campaigned for greater state intervention to provide relief to the people. However,
1 by and large, the American people supported FDR and it was this fact that aided him in controlling Congress
2 and in winning his argument with the Supreme Court.
3
4 ALTERNATIVE QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE
45
(a) Using Sources A and B show how the First New Deal tackled economic depression in
46
the industrial and agricultural sectors. (15)
47
48 (b) Study Sources C and D. Explain the passage of the landmark Social Security Act of
49222 1935. (30)
1 ‘Alphabet agencies’ task
A source of difficulty for students of the New Deal is learning the names and remits of the numerous federal
initiatives that have become known as ‘alphabet agencies’. This group task should ease this problem and
provide points for discussion.
1 Give the full names for the following agencies

2 Arrange them into appropriate groupings
3 Agree upon the most and least successful agencies from the list
AAA CCC CWA FERA FHA NLRB NRA PWA RA SCS SEC TVA WPA
2 Using art as historical sources
What insight do the following sources offer about the experience of the Depression for the people of rural
America?
Lots of folks back east, they say, leaving home The dawn came, but no day. In the gray sky a red
most every day, sun appeared, a dim red circle that gave little light,
Beating the hot old dusty way to the California like dusk; and as that day advanced, the dusk
line. slipped back toward darkness, and the wind cried
Across the desert sands they roll, getting out of and whimpered over the fallen corn.
that old dust bowl Men and women huddled in their houses, and
They think they’re going to a sugar bowl, but they tied handkerchiefs over their noses when they
here is what they find. went out, and wore goggles to protect their eyes.
Now the police at the point of entry say, The Grapes of Wrath,
You’re number fourteen thousand for today. John Steinbeck, 1939
Woody Guthrie
‘Do Re Mi’
Anthony Badger, The New Deal – The Depression Years, R. Garson and S. Kidd (eds), The Roosevelt Years,
1933–1940, Macmillan (1989). Edinburgh University Press (1999).
Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, McGraw-Hill M.J. Heale, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Taylor & Francis (1999).
(2000). Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University
Hugh Brogan, The Penguin History of the USA, Penguin Press (1983/1995).
(1985/1999). R.D. Polenberg, The Era of Franklin D. Roosevelt 1933–
Peter Clements, Prosperity, Depression and the New Deal, 1945, Palgrave (2000).
Hodder & Stoughton (2001). R. Radosh and M. Rothbard (eds), A History of Leviathan,
Paul Douglas, Social Security in the United States: An Ditton (1972).
Analysis and Appraisal of the Federal Social Security Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
Act, Beard Books (1936). Longman (1996).
Albert Fried, FDR and his Enemies, St Martin’s Press
(1999).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 8
5
6
7
8
9 Foreign Policy, 1890–1941
10111
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9 This chapter will consider a period that includes two world wars. With the closing of the
20111 frontier in 1890 the United States began to devote more energy to its influence overseas.
1 By present standards US foreign policy at the turn of the century seems limited and unso-
2 phisticated, but a growing interest in world politics, peacemaking and naval power all set
3
the tone for US foreign policy through the twentieth century. The US did not enter the
4
5 First World War until 1917, by which time illusions of a quick and glamorous victory were
6 long gone. US intervention proved successful but at great human and economic cost. This
7 contributed to an upsurge of isolationism in the 1920s and 1930s, deepened by the impact
8 of the Great Depression but eroded by the rise of aggressive dictatorships in Europe and
9 Asia. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941 the nature of the attack was a shock,
30
but US foreign policy was already moving towards war.
1
2
3 Historical background Isolationism in the 1920s and 1930s
4 The abandonment of isolationism in 1941
5 The emergence of the US as a world power,
6 1890–1914
7 The impact of the First World War upon US Sources
8 foreign policy, 1914–1920
9 1 The causes of the Spanish-American
A more conservative foreign policy, 1921–1936
40 War
The US’s road to war, 1937–1941
1 2 Arguments for neutrality in the First
2 World War
3 Essays
4
Historical skills
45 US foreign policy in the 1890s
46 Theodore Roosevelt’s foreign policy 1 Assessing US Presidents in foreign policy
47 Causes of US intervention in the First World War 2 The extent of change in US foreign policy
48 The US and the Treaty of Versailles 1890–1941
49222
190 • FOREIGN POLICY, 1890–1941
Chronology
1898 April–August Spanish-American War

July US annexation of Hawaii
December Treaty of Paris gave the US control of Puerto Rico, Guam and the
Philippines
1899 ‘Open Door’ policy announced for China
1900 Boxer Rebellion in China
1902 Platt Amendment established US protection over Cuba
1903 November Panama Canal Treaty gave the US power to build the Panama
Canal (started 1906, completed 1914)
1904 Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine
1905 September Treaty of Portsmouth marked end of the Russo-Japanese War
1906 Algerciras Conference
1913 February General Huerta seized power in Mexico, leading to civil war until
1917 (Carranza victorious)
1914 Outbreak of the First World War in Europe. US declared neutrality
1915 May Lusitania was sunk by a German U-boat killing 128 Americans
1916 Jan.–Feb. Colonel Edward House’s second peace mission to Europe
July British blacklisting of US and Latin American firms dealing with
Germany
1917 January US severed diplomatic relations with Germany
February ‘Zimmerman Telegram’ revealed
April US declared war on Germany
1918 January Wilson announced his ‘Fourteen Points’ peace plan
November End of First World War with Allies and US victorious
1919 Jan.–June Paris Peace Conference
Signing of Treaty of Versailles included provision for a League of
Nations
1920 Treaty of Versailles finally rejected by the US Senate
1921 August US signed separate peace treaties with Germany, Austria and
Hungary
November Washington Conference convened to limit naval power (until
February 1922)
1924 April Dawes Plan introduced to help German recovery
1928 August Kellogg-Briand Pact in Paris renounced war
1929 June Young Plan reduced German reparations
October Wall Street crash
1930 Jan.–April London Conference set new naval limits accepted by US, Britain
and Japan
1931 September Japanese occupation of Manchuria, minor US protest
1933 US officially recognised the USSR
1935 August Pittman Resolution limited Presidential power to apply sanctions
August First Neutrality Act
1936 February Second Neutrality Act
1937 May Third Neutrality Act
July Japanese invasion of China
1111
2111
3
4111 1938 March German annexation of Austria
5 October German annexation of the Czechoslovakian Sudetenland
6 1939 March German invasion of Czechoslovakia
7 September German invasion of Poland leading to outbreak of the
8 Second World War in Europe
9 1940 September Conscription introduced
10111 1941 January Lend-lease plan introduced for Britain and China
1 July Japanese invasion of Indo-China led US to freeze Japanese assets
2 August Atlantic Charter
3 November ‘Hull Note’ to Japan
4 December Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor led US to declare war on Japan
5 December Germany declared war on the US
6
7
8
9
20111
1
2 The emergence of the US as a world power, 1890–1914
3
4 The end of the frontier in 1890 coincided with, but only partly caused, a growing attention by the US
5 government to foreign policy. Before the 1890s the US had no distinct foreign policy other than an adher-
6 ence to the 1823 Monroe Doctrine (that pronounced all of the Americas to be within the US sphere of
7 interest) and a wish to support US economic investment abroad. The latter point combined with westward
8 expansion in the late nineteenth century to produce a growing US interest in the Pacific. There was terri-
9 torial expansion (Alaska and Midway) but growing economic domination of independent states such as
30 Hawaii was more typical of US activity. This was accompanied by a Christian missionary zeal and a wish
1 to bring civilised US attitudes to less enlightened parts of the world. As a result, US visitors, traders and
2 settlers were to be found all over the Pacific, the Caribbean and Latin America. While the government had
3 no specific foreign policy to regulate this, in the 1880s it began to build a modern navy to protect US
4 interests. The 1880s and 1890s saw European powers seeking to build up huge colonial empires, most
5 notably in the ‘scramble for Africa’, where the interior was hurriedly carved up between the colonial powers,
6 but also in the Far East, where a weak and disunited China was forced to accept European trade interests.
7 The US was not willing to allow a potential major trading partner fall under complete European domina-
8 tion, and declared itself hostile to European-style colonial expansion (having formerly been a set of British
9 colonies itself). Presidents Harrison (1889–93) and Cleveland (1893–7) contrasted US tolerance and free-
40 dom to European empire-building. It was in the Caribbean, however, that US world power status, and its
1 own colonial empire, was established in the 1890s. Cuba had long been a Spanish colony but had been
2 open to US trade. However, a native uprising led to brutal Spanish suppression and commitment of troops
3 to the island. US sympathy was with the uprising and a chain of provocative events in early 1898 led to
4 President McKinley declaring war on Spain. The war itself was brief and showed the limits of US military
45 might. However, Spain was unable to maintain the war and agreed to a peace deal that made Cuba inde-
46 pendent and thus likely to fall even more under US influence. More significantly, the US received the
47 Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico. When added to existing territorial possessions and the US annexation
48 of Hawaii in 1898 and American Samoa in 1900, the US entered the twentieth century as a Great Power
49222 comparable to the major European empires.
Figure 8.1 Theodore Roosevelt surrounded by his ‘Rough Riders’, 1898
The expansion of US control and influence brought with it new responsibilities and problems. In 1900
US soldiers were fighting in both the Philippines, to crush a nationalist uprising there, and in China, where
the ‘Boxer’ rebellion by Chinese nationalists attacked US and European interests there. These were some
of the issues faced by Theodore Roosevelt, who served as President 1901–9. His aggressive manner and
favourite foreign policy saying ‘speak softly and carry a ‘big stick’ have given him an image as a forceful,
expansionist maker of foreign policy. In reality he was more conservative and cautious than this image
suggests, and did not lead his country into any new wars. However the US asserted itself more in foreign
policy under Roosevelt than it had done before. Roosevelt added his own ‘Corollary’ to the Monroe
Doctrine, justifying pre-emptive action in the name of good government, but in effect to protect US inter-
ests in the Americas. He also built up and paraded the modern US navy. The showpiece achievement of
the Roosevelt Presidency, the Panama Canal, was begun in controversial circumstances, with the US backing
a Panamanian secession from Colombia in order to secure permission to build the canal. Roosevelt also
intervened in Cuba when a 1906 rebellion there threatened US interests, in the Dominican Republic when
it was threatened by European powers trying to collect debts, and he refereed a dispute between Venezuela
and Britain. Elsewhere Roosevelt built a reputation as peacemaker, helping Japan and Russia to reach a
post-war settlement in 1905 and chairing an international conference at Algeciras in 1906 to settle a dispute
over Morocco. One effect of this was to establish a tradition of Presidential leadership in US foreign policy,
1111 which was not always maintained in the decades afterwards but was more apparent in the second half of
2111 the twentieth century.
3 Roosevelt’s successor, William Taft (President 1909–13), was a product of Roosevelt’s foreign policy,
4111 serving first as governor of the Philippines and then as Secretary of War. Taft was less inclined to inter-
5 vene directly in world affairs than Roosevelt had been, preferring a ‘dollar diplomacy’ approach that
6 encouraged US business investment abroad. However, he still intervened militarily in Nicaragua when a
7 rebellion there threatened US business interests. This deepened anti-US feeling in Central America and left
8 problems for his successor, Woodrow Wilson (1913–21) to deal with. Wilson is best known for his deci-
9 sion to enter the First World War and his work at the Paris Peace Conference after the war. In Central
10111 America, however, he took an interventionist approach, establishing US protectorates over Haiti and the
1 Dominican Republic, and opposing the new dictator of Mexico, General Huerta. This led to the destabil-
2 isation of Mexico and attacks on US citizens, resulting in over 10,000 US troops operating in Mexico by
3 1916. Wilson’s desire to ‘teach the South American republics to elect good men’ reflected the overbearing
4 and interventionist approach of US foreign policy in the Americas at this time.
5
6
7 The impact of the First World War upon US foreign policy,
8 1914–1920
9
20111 Although the US did not enter the First World War until 1917, the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914
1 forced Wilson to make some uncomfortable decisions. While he privately supported the Allies, he was aware
2 of the divide in US public opinion over the war and he also recognised that the US was remote from the
3 causes and theatre of conflict. His initial request that the US remain completely neutral and impartial could
4 not be sustained for long. By 1915 the war was clearly not going to end quickly and US trade interests were
5 suffering from the naval blockades imposed by Britain and Germany against each other. Trade with Britain
6 and France was the more practicable option, but both powers were unable to buy US goods without credit
7 and Germany was using U-boats to sink merchant shipping. With business interests warning of economic
8 recession in the US, Wilson authorised US loans to the Allies and pressured Germany into stopping its
9 U-boat campaign. Real US neutrality had ended, therefore, by 1915.
30 Wilson now looked at ways to bring the World War to a peaceful end. Attempts to mediate between
1 the Allies and the Central Powers failed during 1915 and 1916, but Wilson developed his own ideas of open
2 diplomacy, national self-determination, general disarmament and a just peace without victory during the
3 war. This was to lead to his ‘Fourteen Points’ peace programme, proposed at the start of 1918. In the
4 meantime, fears that the Allies might be defeated, continued submarine attacks and the discovery of a
5 German offer of an anti-American alliance to Mexico led to a US declaration of war against the Central
6 Powers in April 1917. It was hoped that this would accelerate the end of the war and give the US the chance
7 to shape the post-war peace.
8 The US was not ready for war in 1917, but exceeded foreign expectations by training and equip-
9 ping over two million soldiers in time for them to play a part on the Western Front in Europe. The
40 US expeditionary forces to Europe were desperately needed. Russia underwent communist revolution
1 in November 1917 and subsequently pulled out of the war, allowing Germany to launch a strong assault
2 on the Western Front in early 1918. Despite this, Wilson refused to send US troops piecemeal to be
3 integrated into existing Allied commands, reminding Britain and France that the US had entered the war
4 as an ‘Associated’ not ‘Allied’ power. US troops really began to make their presence felt in a successful first
45 encounter against a major German force in early June 1918, and thereafter there was a rapid flow of trained
46 and equipped US soldiers into France. This helped the Allied counter-offensive of July 1918 to become a
47 decisive success.
48 Equally significant was the intervention of the US navy in the war. The Allies had lost nearly a million
49222 tons of shipping in April 1917 alone. The US introduced and provided protection for convoys of merchant
shipping, and began to lay a barrage of sea mines in the North Sea to catch German U-boats. An Emergency
Fleet Corporation, set up in April 1917, rapidly built up US naval strength, more than outweighing the
losses to U-boats. The results were dramatically successful; U-boat attacks fell by two-thirds within six
months and no US troop ships were lost at all in 1918.
Within the US a Committee on Public Information was established in April 1917 to secure public
support for the US intervention in the war. Public speakers, posters and pamphlets were used to justify
the intervention. Civil liberties were undermined by the 1917 Espionage Act and the 1918 Sedition
Act. These gave the government the power to suppress active opposition to the war effort and led to the
imprisonment of approximately 1,500 people. Steps were taken to regulate war industries, food and fuel
production and distribution, railways and merchant shipping. Tax increases raised over $11 billion and the
sale of government bonds over $20 million. These domestic initiatives far outreached those from any
previous wars. With approximately 115,000 US soldiers killed in action or through disease the war had an
unprecedented impact on the US and helped to generate anti-war feeling and isolationism after 1918.
Despite Wilson’s efforts to create a just and lasting peace settlement after the war, the Paris Peace Con-
ference led to a harsh and punitive Treaty of Versailles against Germany. The most ‘Wilsonian’ aspect of the
Treaty was the creation of a League of Nations. American membership was rejected by the US Senate despite
a substantial level of public support. This set the tone for a relatively isolationist foreign policy in the 1920s
and contributed to the defeat of Wilson’s preferred successor, the Democratic candidate James Cox.
A more conservative foreign policy, 1921–1936
Both the new President, Warren Harding (1921–3) and his successor Calvin Coolidge (1923–9) took little
personal interest in foreign policy beyond a pledge to keep the US out of the League of Nations. However,
the Secretary of State up to 1925, Charles Hughes, pursued an active foreign policy. This included an inter-
national conference in Washington during 1921–2 to negotiate a disarmament treaty and establish Great
Power rights in the Far East and the Pacific. The conference was, at least temporarily, a success and enabled
the US to reduce its defence budget in the 1920s. It was decided that the US and Britain would have naval
parity. Japan would be allowed to build its navy up to 60 per cent of the US’s naval strength; and France
and Italy would each be allowed to build to one-third of the US’s naval strength. The ‘Open Door’ policy
towards China, sought by the US since the 1890s, was agreed upon. The US also involved itself in European
problems by introducing the Dawes Plan in 1924: essentially a massive US loan to help Germany to
economic recovery and recommence reparation payments. The Harding government also reduced US
commitments in Latin America, recognising General Obregon’s Mexican government in 1923 in return for
compensation for land seized in the 1910s and guarantees of US oil and mineral business holdings. The
piecemeal withdrawal of US troops from the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua began in 1924. All of this
reflected the US’s wish to avoid military commitments and instead seek peaceful diplomatic solutions to
problems. As this was similar to the aims of the League of Nations, it was perhaps unsurprising that by
1924 the US was sending delegates and observers to League conferences on world economic issues. The
appointment of Frank Kellogg as Secretary of State in 1925 led, however, to a more assertive policy in Latin
America in defence of US business interests, which grew from $1.26 billion in 1920 to $3.52 billion by
1928. A rebellion in Nicaragua in 1927 led to the US despatching 5,000 marines to protect the Diaz govern-
ment, and when a new government in Mexico under Calles tried to place 50-year lease limits on US business
holdings, Kellogg successfully threatened military intervention. A Pan-American conference in Havana in
1928 saw strong criticism of the US and a US refusal to guarantee non-intervention in the future. In contrast,
a pact between Kellogg and French Foreign Minister Briand in 1928, expressing a common wish to renounce
war, was signed by most major powers. However, the pact contained no binding terms and was little more
than a joint statement. The failure of the Geneva Conference the previous year, which attempted to set
further limitations on the Great Powers’ navies, showed that diplomacy could not solve all problems.
1111 Figure 8.2 Map to show the war in the Pacific

2111
3
4111 A R C T I C O C E A N
5 CANADA
ALASKA
6
7
8
9 SOVIET UNION
BERING SEA
10111
s
d
an
Isl
1 ti a
n
Sakhalin I. Ale u
2
3 s Is.
4
r il e
OUTER
Ku
5 MONGOLIA Vladivostock
6 JAPAN
KOREA
7 Beijing
Japanese Terr.
Tokyo and Islands Mandated
8 to Japan by the League
Under US Adm.
9 CHINA After 1945 Midway Is.
Nanking
20111 Pearl
Chungking Haw Harbor
Iwo Jima
1 Okinawa a ii a n
I sla
n ds
2
Hong Taiwan Wake I.
3 BURMA
Kong
Marianas Is.
4
Manila
5 THAILAND Philippine Guam (US)
INDOCHINA Islands
6 Marshall Is.
7 Greatest extent of
Japanese expansion
8 MALAYA
Caroline Islands
June–August, 1942
9 Gilbert Is.
Singapore
30
DU New Guinea Solomon
1 TCH
EAST INDIES Islands
2
3 Guadalcanal
4 CORAL SEA
I N D I A N
5
6 O C E A N
7
AUSTRALIA
8
9
40
1
2 NEW
WAR IN THE PACIFIC ZEALAND
3
4
45
46 Japanese Empire, 1930
47
48 Japanese Conquests, 1931–1942
49222
This was proved especially true as new President Herbert Hoover (1929–33) found his attempts at
diplomatic solutions undermined by the worldwide Great Depression. Initially his foreign policy was
successful as the 1929 Young Plan reduced and rescheduled German reparation payments, and the US
reached agreement with Britain and Japan on naval limits at the 1930 London Conference. However, as
the Depression took hold the Great Powers looked to domestic solutions and trade barriers, and the 1932
World Disarmament Conference at Geneva failed to reach lasting agreement. More ominously, in 1931
Japan broke the agreed ‘Open Door’ in China by occupying Manchuria and disregarded protests by the US
and the League of Nations. In the US, however, the Depression overshadowed all other political issues and
Hoover lost the 1932 election heavily. The Democrat victory made Franklin D. Roosevelt President
(1933–45). His most famous foreign policy achievement was to lead the US to victory in the Second World
War; however in his first Presidential term he was preoccupied with economic recovery and did not yet
take an internationalist approach to foreign policy. At the 1933 World Economic Conference in London,
the US refused to cooperate with other world powers on exchange rates. A series of trade agreements during
1934–6 eventually led to improved cooperation, but this was designed to aid US economic recovery rather
than marking a turning point in US foreign policy. The US took no effective action (and neither, to be
fair, did Britain or France) against Japanese aggression in China or Italian aggression in Abyssinia. Even in
Mexico, where anti-US leader Cardenas began to confiscate US business holdings from 1934 onwards,
Roosevelt opted for peaceful negotiation rather than military intervention. Popular and Congressional
opposition to war and support for isolation was at its peak by the mid-1930s and a series of Neutrality
Acts, designed to prevent the US from being sucked into war as it had been in 1917, were passed during
1935–7. By the end of 1936, with Italy victorious over Abyssinia, Germany rearming and remilitarising the
Rhineland, and the Spanish civil war under way, war in Europe looked more likely than at any point since
1919. However the US’s foreign policy was even less focused on world power politics than it had been in
the 1920s.
The US’s road to war, 1937–1941
The period 1937–41 saw the US first gradually, and then dramatically, pulled into world conflict. An inter-
nationalist foreign policy evolved in response to the aggression of Japan and Germany. Japan’s full-scale
invasion of China in July 1937 was far more significant than their occupation of Manchuria in 1931. US
interests were now directly threatened and Roosevelt sent an extra 1,200 marines to Shanghai to increase
US military presence in China to 3,200. He also began to educate US public opinion against neutrality, but
did not yet feel that collective action against Japan was possible. As a result the US refused to support a
League of Nations initiative against Japan, and even considered withdrawing from China altogether when
US gunboat Panay was sunk by Japan in December 1937. In Europe Germany began to extend its borders
in 1938, but Britain and France chose a policy of appeasement rather than military resistance. Roosevelt
was dubious about this policy but did not try to intervene. Appeasement failed in 1939, and Germany’s
invasion of Poland triggered the outbreak of the Second World War in Europe. The US looked on with
concern, but did not take resolute action. Instead the US defence budget was increased, an open plea to
Germany and Italy to cease aggression was brushed aside and the US embargo on arms sales was lifted, but
only to allow the Allies to pay up front and transport US arms themselves – a ‘cash and carry’ principle.
The US therefore took a more neutral stance in the first months of the Second World War than in the
corresponding months of the First World War, even though in the second war it was much clearer which
side was the aggressor.
The year 1940 saw a tremendous sequence of German victories in Europe, leaving France defeated and
the British Empire in serious danger. War between the Allies and Axis was one thing, the likelihood of
comprehensive victory for the Axis powers was more serious and a direct threat to US interests. The US
ESSAYS • 197
1111 was especially concerned that French, Dutch and British colonies in the Far East were now vulnerable to
2111 Japanese attack. Further defence budget increases, tougher economic sanctions against Japan and an arms
3 deal with Britain all followed. By the middle of 1941 the US had passed a ‘lend-lease’ bill to provide more
4111 arms to Britain and had occupied Iceland for strategic reasons. A Japanese attack on southern Indo-China
5 in July 1941 started the countdown to US intervention. Japanese domination of the Far East was now a
6 genuine possibility. Germany had launched an invasion of the USSR in the previous month with consid-
7 erable success, and began to attack US destroyers in the Atlantic during September and October. Final
8 attempts at diplomatic agreement between Japan and the US failed in November, making war inevitable
9 in Japan’s eyes. Japan then launched a pre-emptive attack at the US naval base in Hawaii, Pearl Harbor,
10111 in December. The US immediately declared war in response and Germany in turn declared war on the US
1 a few days later. The US, therefore, did not enter the Second World War at a time of its choosing and it
2 was to be nearly a year before it was able to make an impact on the outcome of the war. As with Britain
3 and France, US foreign policy in the 1930s represented a failure. The Second World War was only won
4 nearly four years after US entry to the war, and at tremendous cost.
5
6
7
8 Part 2: Essays
9
20111
US foreign policy in the 1890s
1
2
1 From McKinley’s ‘war’ message to Congress, 1898:
3
4 . . . The present condition of affairs in Cuba is a constant menace to our peace . . . and compel us
5 to keep on a semi-war footing with a nation with which we are at peace . . .
6
(a) Explain the Monroe Doctrine in relation to US foreign policy. (3)
7
8 (b) Explain the significance of the Spanish-American War. (7)
9
(c) Explain why US foreign policy changed in the 1890s? (15)
30
(AQA format)
1
2
3 (a) The Monroe Doctine was named after President James Monroe, but was essentially put together by
4 John Quincy Adams in the 1820s. It claimed that all of the Americas came within the sphere of interest of
5 the US. This belief would contribute to US intervention in several areas of the Caribbean, Pacific, Central
6 and South America during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including the Spanish-American War
7 in Cuba in 1898. The Doctine also asserted that the US would not interfere in any of the internal concerns
8 of the European powers.
9
40 (b) By modern standards, the Spanish-American War was a minor conflict. Nor was it a turning point in
1 US foreign policy. However, it did encapsulate US foreign policy direction and the US victory had conse-
2 quences well beyond Cuba, the venue for the war.
3 President McKinley had said the previous year he wished to avoid ‘wars of conquest’. However the
4 outbreak of war in 1898 reflected the influences in the US that could now push the country into war. Cuba
45 was only 90 miles from Florida and US businesses had invested heavily in Cuban sugar plantations. Ironically
46 a US-imposed tariff on foreign sugar in 1892 had indirectly caused the 1895 Cuban uprising. Spain deployed
47 nearly 200,000 troops to Cuba over the following three years, and ruthlessly suppressed the uprising. The
48 US press, especially newspapers owned by press barons Hearst and Pulitzer, reported Spanish atrocities in
49222 detail, stirring up public opinion against Spain. Two events in February 1898 heightened press outrage:
firstly, the sinking of US battleship Maine in Havana harbour with 260 crew lost, then the publication of
a leaked letter written to the US by the Spanish ambassador, de Lome, which sneered at McKinley. Congress
responded to popular feeling by approving $50 million in military spending. McKinley, under pressure
from press, public opinion, Congress and his own party colleagues, went with the flow and intervened in
Cuba. This inevitably led to a Spanish declaration of war in April 1898.
The nature of the war had an impact on US military development. At a cost of approximately $250
million and nearly 5,500 lives (mostly from disease) the war was won by August. The army effort grabbed
press headlines but it made little impact, being literally bogged down and suffering from malaria, yellow
fever and unsuitable clothing. The real success story for the US was its navy. A swift attack on the Spanish
Pacific fleet at Manila Bay in May was successful and made a hero of US Pacific fleet commander Dewey.
This was followed by a decisive US naval victory off Santiago, Cuba in July, leaving Spain unable to pursue
the war further, and raising the status of the emergent US navy as a formidable force.
Dewey was not the only hero in the war. Theodore Roosevelt, a relatively junior government figure as
Under-Secretary for the navy before 1898, led a volunteer cavalry unit nicknamed the ‘Rough Riders’. This
unit was a scratch mixture of different occupations and delighted the press, especially its involvement at
the Battle of San Juan Hill in July 1898. Roosevelt, exhilarated by the war (‘I killed a Spaniard with my
own hands’, he boasted afterwards) and elected governor of New York on the strength of his war record
shortly afterwards, rose to become Republican Vice-President, and then, following the assassination of
McKinley, President by the end of 1901. His interventionist approach led to a more active US foreign policy
during the early twentieth century. His rise to the Presidency was at least accelerated by, and possibly caused
by, his role in the war.
The outcome of the war expanded the US’s global influence, but also brought new problems with its
new responsibilities. The Treaty of Paris in December 1898 saw Spain confirm Cuba’s independence,
the granting of Puerto Rico and Guam to the US and the ‘sale’ of the formerly Spanish Philippines to the
US for $20 million. The US had also annexed Hawaii for security reasons during the war. Cuba quickly
fell under greater US influence. By the 1920s three-quarters of Cuban imports came from the US, and
four-fifths of Cuban exports went to the US. The US position was affected, however, by the civil wars, revo-
lutions and growing Cuban resentment of US influence that led ultimately to the ascendancy of Castro in
the 1950s. In the shorter term, the Philippines proved even more problematic. A pro-independence uprising
and guerrilla warfare campaign there resulted in 70,000 US troops deployed at a cost of $200 million to
fight an ultimately successful but uncomfortable war from 1899 to 1902. The US had, despite some oppo-
sition to imperialism at home, emerged as a global world power. The Spanish-American War was one of
several factors that caused this. World power status gave the US some difficult foreign policy dilemmas in
the decades that followed.
(c) The closing of the frontier in 1890 is generally seen as a turning point for US foreign policy. With
westward expansion complete, US expansionist tendencies would inevitably show a greater interest in affairs
beyond the boundaries of the US, especially the Pacific where the US now had a long western seaboard.
The result of this was a more proactive and interventionist foreign policy from the 1890s onwards. However,
most US foreign policy initiatives in the 1890s were based either on longer-term economic expansion or
reactions to the initiatives of other powers.
Before the 1890s the United States, outside its own geographical sphere, limited itself to minor terri-
torial acquisitions in the Pacific, for example Alaska and the Midway Islands in 1867, and the operation
of the 1823 Monroe Doctrine in the Caribbean, Central and South America. However, its expansion of
economic interests was rapid. US farming and manufacturing output were exceeding domestic demand
by about 10 per cent by the late 1800s. This led to an interest in opening up foreign markets and increas-
ing influence in world trade. For example, in Hawaii the first US missionaries had arrived in 1819. This
was followed by economic colonialism and by 1885 Hawaiian sugar production was worth $8.4 million.
ESSAYS • 199
1111 By 1892 about 21 per cent of the population were white settlers from the US or Europe, and they owned
2111 about two-thirds of Hawaiian property, including all the sugar farms. Once this economic dominance
3 was threatened in the 1890s, the US soon acted to bring Hawaii under their control. This economic expan-
4111 sion did not automatically lead the US to seek a colonial empire, but it did lead to a more assertive foreign
5 policy. President Cleveland explained this well during his first term in office in 1886 when he referred
6 to ‘our close and manifest interest in the commerce of the Pacific Ocean’ as reason to keep a close eye
7 on Hawaii.
8 It is harder to measure the psychological factors that influenced the US in overseas expansion. However
9 there was a surge of interest in ‘Social Darwinism’ during the 1880s and 1890s, a theory that the fittest
10111 races and creeds would eventually triumph over inferiors. This seemed to fit well with US ideals and success
1 up to that point, and provided a racist rationale for the white, largely Protestant United States to become
2 dominant in world affairs. One writer, John Fiske, predicted ‘a world covered with cheerful homesteads
3 blessed with a sabbath of perpetual peace’ as an outcome of Social Darwinism. Coupled with this was a
4 religious and moral belief that the US could act as a Christian and civilising influence in less enlightened
5 parts of the world. Josiah Strong’s Our Country (1885) called the US the ‘workshop of the world’ and also
6 equated US expansion with the spread of Christianity. These opinions cannot be directly linked to US
7 foreign policy in the 1890s, but they were flying around intellectual circles at the time and were likely to
8 have influenced government thinking. More concrete evidence is found in the development of the US navy.
9 Construction of steel warships began in 1883, and by 1900 the US had the third strongest navy in the world.
20111 Captain Alfred Mahan (naval strategist and author of The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1890) argued
1 that naval expansion was needed to support economic expansion, if not necessarily territorial expansion.
2 The 1893 Chicago World Fair had a 30-acre showpiece display depicting the US navy’s new ‘Great White
3 Fleet’, attracting thousands of visitors. However this navy would be used in future, it did reflect, and
4 encourage, a growing interest in US foreign affairs.
5 The changing economic, social and political situation within the US, all greater priorities to successive
6 Presidents than foreign affairs, pushed US foreign policy to a more assertive level. Industrial output rose
7 rapidly between the 1860s and early 1880s, bringing with it social transition. Republican congressman John
8 Kasson warned in 1881: ‘we must turn our eyes abroad, or they will look inward upon discontent.’ Economic
9 depression during 1882–6 did not lead to a reorientation of foreign policy. However, the 1890s saw a sharper
30 and deeper depression. Unemployment in the manufacturing and transport sectors rose from 4 per cent
1 in 1892 to 16.7 per cent in 1894. This led to a sense of panic during 1893 and 1894. Approximately 160,000
2 miners went on strike, thousands of unemployed marched on Washington, riots broke out in Californian
3 cities and federal troops were used to quell industrial unrest in Chicago. The New York Tribune warned of
4 ‘a nondescript socialism as dangerous and revolutionary as it is imbecile and grotesque’. The political
5 consensus was that the depression was caused by overproduction and that the US would have to do more
6 to open up world markets for its products. The Republicans won control of Congress in 1894, then the
7 Presidency in 1896. This resulted in a ruling political and economic elite (including much of the press) all
8 agreed that active foreign policy would serve economic recovery. Even so, the new Republican President,
9 McKinley, warned (and meant it) in 1897 ‘we must avoid the temptation of territorial aggression’. Events
40 outside the US, though, overrode his warning.
1 The US, having established economic influence in the world, found this influence under threat in the
2 1890s. In Hawaii the accession of Queen Liliuokalani in 1891 led to attempts to reduce the influence
3 of foreign settlers and traders. This led to unrest in Hawaii and, eventually, US annexation in 1898 as a
4 means of securing its economic position. In South America resentment of US influence was growing – for
45 example in 1891 an angry mob attacked US sailors in Chile, and the US’s successful demand of an official
46 apology after threatening war made relations worse. At the same time European powers were extending
47 their imperial influence. Germany and Britain both competed with the US for trade with Samoa, leading
48 to a fragile tri-power agreement in 1889, and Britain tried to forcibly assert control over a disputed border
49222 territory between British Guiana and independent Venezuela, where gold had been discovered. A US threat
of war was needed to persuade Britain to agree to independent arbitration, which ruled in their favour
anyway. Most significant of all was unrest in Spanish-ruled Cuba followed by ruthless Spanish attempts to
reassert control. This escalated into the 1898 Spanish-American War, marking a new aggression in US
foreign policy.
US economic expansion was always likely to be followed by a more active government interest in
foreign affairs. The quickening pace of world events by the 1890s combined with domestic discontent,
changing US foreign policy in response to these factors. However, this was still far short of the more pro-
active foreign policies that developed in the twentieth century.
Theodore Roosevelt’s foreign policy
2 Theodore Roosevelt:
‘Speak softly and carry a big stick’
(a) Explain the ‘Roosevelt Corollary’ in relation to US foreign policy. (3)

(b) Explain the motivation behind Theodore Roosevelt’s policy in Latin America and
the Far East. (7)
(c) Explain how far Theodore Roosevelt’s foreign policy was a failure. (15)
(AQA)
(a) The ‘Roosevelt Corollary’ of 1904 was a more assertive version of the Monroe Doctrine, by which the
US would seek to oppose any attempt at European imperialism in the Americas, taking pre-emptive action
if necessary, even if it meant intervening in the domestic affairs of its neighbours in certain cases. The Corollary
was first put into action with regard to the Dominican Republic, and was basically a response to the expansion
of European empires in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It reflected Roosevelt’s ‘big stick’
approach to foreign relations, and was marked by an increase in the size of the US navy.
(b) Roosevelt’s bombastic manner and hands-on approach to foreign policy (the first US President to visit
a foreign country while in office), plus his support for the 1898 war with Spain and the 1917 entry to the
First World War, give an initial impression of an aggressive, ambitious maker of foreign policy. In reality
his motives were more conservative and contradictory; his favourite saying ‘speak softly and carry a big
stick’ in itself shows some inconsistency in his approach to foreign policy. This is less of a reflection on
Roosevelt than on the transitional nature of world affairs during his Presidency. Problems in Latin America
and the Far East were especially complex.
Unsurprisingly in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War, Roosevelt saw the Caribbean as
very important. He paid special attention to the building of a canal in Panama, negotiating agreement
from Britain and protecting a Panamanian independence uprising when it became clear that Colombia,
Panama’s previous rulers, would not grant the US the land it wanted for the canal. Roosevelt’s motives
for building the canal were strategic as well as economic, providing a link between US Caribbean and
Pacific interests.
In 1904 Roosevelt added what became known as the ‘Roosevelt Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine: the US
demanded that European powers would not extend their influence in the Americas, and also asserted that
US pre-emptive action would be taken if appropriate to defend its interests. This reflected Roosevelt’s
concern at European imperialism. For example, when the Dominican Republic failed to repay its loans
from Europe, and European warships arrived to collect the debts, Roosevelt persuaded US creditors to take
over the debts in order to prevent further European intervention. However, when Venezuela also defaulted
on its loans, and Germany and Britain then blockaded Venezuela, Roosevelt told the German ambassador:
ESSAYS • 201
1111 ‘If any South American state misbehaves toward any European country, let the European country spank
2111 it.’ The US subsequently persuaded Venezuela to submit to international arbitration on the matter, but
3 Roosevelt’s comment shows that he would not take the Monroe Doctrine so far as to encourage Latin
4111 American defaulting on loans.
5 In the Far East Roosevelt was mainly concerned to prevent any one power from becoming dominant.
6 The US itself was not powerful enough to dominate, but had already established significant economic influ-
7 ence in the Far East, especially China, whose huge potential market seemed an ideal outlet for US exports.
8 However, China was unstable and restless (for example the 1900 Boxer rising) and the US ‘Open Door’
9 policy introduced in 1899 was already failing. Japan seemed the best counterbalance to European ambi-
10111 tions to dominate China. This, coupled with Roosevelt’s dislike of Russia’s expansionism and anti-Semitism,
1 led to a pro-Japanese policy, especially over the 1904–5 Russo-Japanese War. However, after Japan won
2 the war the US became concerned about the growth of Japanese power, and tried to encourage a peace
3 that kept China free of control by either power. Roosevelt tended to put security and strategic aims ahead
4 of business and economic aims, allowing Japan to take control of Korea in the face of US business inter-
5 ests there, although he also tried to shore up the unsuccessful America-China Development Company when
6 its railway project in China was collapsing.
7 In both the Far East and Latin America Roosevelt had a common motive, to stop any one world power
8 from gaining the ascendancy over others. This motivated other areas of his foreign policy and, later, led to
9 the US’s steps to intervention in both world wars.
20111
1
(c) In 1907 Roosevelt sent the ‘Great White Fleet’ (the US navy), which had doubled in size and budget
2
during his Presidency, on a world tour to demonstrate US strength and purpose, and deter rival powers
3
from acting in the face of US interests. This was typical of his ‘big stick’ foreign policy, which was more
4
ambitious and proactive than that of any previous President. There is no doubt that Roosevelt failed to
5
achieve some of his foreign policy aims, but this does not mean his policies should be judged as failures
6
in terms of the world situation and the constraints Roosevelt worked under.
7
The most enduring success of Roosevelt’s foreign policy was the building of the Panama Canal. He
8
had supported the canal idea since the 1890s and was quick to prepare the ground once he came to power.
9
He successfully won Britain’s support in return for a promise that the canal would be open to all shipping.
30
1 The following year, in 1902, a treaty with Colombia was drawn up for the US to purchase a 99-year lease
2 on a strip of land across Panama for $10 million, plus an annual payment of $250,000 starting nine years
3 after the lease began. This was a bargain price and it was no great surprise that the Colombian Senate
4 refused to ratify it. The plan survived, however, due to a Panamanian nationalist uprising in November
5 1903. The US immediately sent naval support to the nationalists and, before the new Panama government
6 could assess the treaty properly, secured the canal land on the same terms previously offered to Colombia.
7 This was a tremendous success for the US, so much so that Roosevelt, when discussing the canal with a
8 re-election campaign manager in 1904, claimed: ‘We have not a stronger card.’ By the end of his Presidency
9 in 1909, the building of the canal was well under way (built cheaply by West Indian workers on 60-hour
40 weeks at 10 cents per hour), and it was eventually completed in 1914.
1 Elsewhere in the Americas Roosevelt was constrained by anti-US feeling, political instability and the
2 threat of European interference. He was able to defuse the loan defaulting crises in the Dominican Republic
3 and Venezuela, US creditors taking over Dominican threats and Venezuela agreeing to submit to the
4 International Court at the Hague. The ‘Roosevelt Corollary’ was a success during Roosevelt’s own
45 Presidency. It should be noted though that he did not have to deal with any European interference on the
46 same scale as Spain in Cuba in the 1890s. Nor did his policy win the US friends in Latin America. His
47 successors, Taft and Wilson, both had to deal with the consequences of Latin American resentment. Unrest
48 in Nicaragua, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and, worst of all, Mexico provided the US with foreign policy
49222 headaches during the 1910s.
In the Far East, by contrast, Roosevelt was less successful but deserves more credit given the worsening
situation there. China was at the heart of the problem, with European powers grabbing trade concessions
and the control of key ports there. Forces within China (especially the Boxers) destabilised the weak,
disunited state further, making a US/China alliance impractical. And Japan, an emerging Great Power, was
extending its influence over its neighbour. The US’s ‘Open Door’ policy, designed to encourage free trade
and stop further infiltration of China by rival powers, had already failed. Its architect, Secretary of State
Hay, said in 1900 ‘our public opinion will not permit us to interfere with an army to prevent others from
robbing her [China]. Besides, we have no army’. This summed up the problems well: indifference within
the United States itself, a lack of US military power in the Far East, and the inference that rival powers
could not be trusted (or trust each other) not to exploit China. Roosevelt’s chosen option was to support
Japan, and initially this seemed to work well. A secret agreement in 1905 saw the US and Japan pledge not
to interfere in Korea and the Philippines respectively. The Russo-Japanese War of 1904–5 also brought an
initially pleasing outcome for the US. To the delight of the US, Japan started the war with a surprise naval
attack on the Russian fleet at Port Arthur (the same tactic used at Pearl Harbor 37 years later), and further
Japanese victories destroyed the Russian naval threat in the Far East. Roosevelt’s main aim now was to
prevent Japan from achieving further dominance, and he brokered a peace in 1905 that saw neither side
take any Chinese territory. This success was undone by a secret Russo-Japanese agreement in 1907 to
dismember Manchuria and much of northern China between them in the future. It is hard to see how
Roosevelt could have done more at the time, but he did seem to underestimate Japanese strength and
ambition. Future Presidents would also fail to block Japanese ambition, which eventually pulled the US
into the Second World War.
Roosevelt was more successful in his foreign policy towards Europe, although this was of less signifi-
cance than his failure in East Asia. He wanted to see the balance of European power kept. He was on
friendly terms with the German Kaiser Wilhelm II and regarded Britain as a declining power. This led to
attempts at peacemaking diplomacy, designed to avoid a major European war that might leave one power
dominant. Friendly terms with Britain were secured in 1903 after negotiations on a disputed border between
Alaska and Canada were settled amicably. Roosevelt then offered to intervene when Germany disputed
France’s position in Morocco. The resulting 1906 Algeciras Conference was a success. Germany climbed
down from the dispute and all the Great Powers accepted Roosevelt’s proposals for international regula-
tion of trade, banking and peacekeeping in Morocco. This did not prevent, but perhaps delayed, the eventual
outbreak of European war. As a follow-up, at Roosevelt’s suggestion, an international peace conference was
held at the Hague in 1907. This was an attempt to codify international law and attracted representatives
from 44 states, but it failed to agree on arms control. The Algeciras Conference thus represented the peak
of Roosevelt’s foreign policy towards Europe.
Theodore Roosevelt received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906, and there was certainly no lack of effort in
his foreign policy. Ultimately he did not increase US security or the chances of world peace. He did however
set US foreign policy on its twentieth-century course, with the US acting as a ‘Great Power’ for the first time
and trying to lead international diplomacy. His foreign policy cannot be regarded as a complete failure.
Causes of US intervention in the First World War
PRACTICE QUESTIONS
3 (a) How far was the Zimmerman telegram the most important short-term reason for the
US’s entry into the First World War? (30)
(b) To what extent were economic reasons the main cause of the US’s entry into the First
World War? (60)
(OCR)
ESSAYS • 203
1111 Advice: To answer these questions effectively it is necessary to consider a range of factors including: public
2111 opinion and support for the Allies in the US at various times leading up to 1917: the impact of U-boat action
3 against shipping (e.g. sinking of the Lusitania); attitudes towards the safeguarding of democracy; economic
4111 factors and the influence of the ‘merchants of death’; the February revolution in Russia; and the Zimmerman
5 telegram.
6
7
8 The US and the Treaty of Versailles
9
10111
4 (a) Explain the US’s attitude to the Treaty of Versailles. (30)
1
2 (b) Why and to what extent did the US pursue a policy of isolationism in the 1920s and
3 1930s? (60)
4 (OCR)
5
6 (a) Wilson, elected President of the United States, had brought his country into the First World War with
7 the intention of helping shape the post-war peace. He devised a coherent peace settlement and was present
8 at discussions in Paris where a modified version of the settlement, including a planned League of Nations,
9 was drawn up. Most of Congress, including the Senate, wanted some kind of settlement and League of
20111 Nations, even if not quite in the form drawn up in Paris. Public opinion in the US was also favourable.
1 Despite this, for reasons which are not immediately obvious, the Treaty was rejected by the Senate. The
2 US refused to join the League of Nations and thus appeared to isolate itself from world affairs during the
3 1920s and 1930s. This is not easily explained, but the simplistic notion that the US’s rejection of the Treaty
4 was caused by a wave of post-war isolationism is misleading.
5 Even though the US did want to participate in some kind of post-war settlement, there was already a
6 feeling that US participation in the war had been a mistake and that US citizens had been killed without
7 justification. Criticism of munitions manufacturers did not yet reach the levels of the 1930s, but there were
8 accusations of profiteers growing rich from the war at the expense of human lives. A post-war settlement
9 including a League of Nations would be satisfactory as long as the US was not bound by its decisions to
30 intervene in Europe again. Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who led opposition to the Treaty of Versailles,
1 struck a key note when he said in 1919: ‘the hard practical demand is, are you ready to put your soldiers
2 and sailors at the disposition of other nations?’ Lodge himself favoured some kind of League but for many
3 the memory of the First World War was still too immediate to proceed without caution.
4 Wilson’s original ‘Fourteen Points’ proposal for a peace settlement was the starting point for discus-
5 sions at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. However, the Treaty of Versailles that emerged seemed more
6 designed to punish Germany than to create lasting and harmonious peace. Proposals for a League of Nations
7 survived, but were surrounded by other issues such as the confiscation of German territory (including all
8 colonies), demands for heavy reparations, forced disarmament and placing the blame for starting the war
9 firmly upon Germany. French leader Clemenceau and, to a lesser extent, British leader Lloyd George,
40 demanded particular clauses and concessions from Germany. As Wilson’s vision for peace was general
1 rather than specific, his plan was gradually undermined and unpicked by the other two leaders. The treaty
2 became seen as a ‘winner’s peace’, with Germany given no opportunity to negotiate and Japan allowed to
3 keep its de facto control of the Shantung province in China. Furthermore, Wilson seems to have repre-
4 sented US interests poorly. John Maynard Keynes (part of the British delegation at Paris) was unimpressed
45 by Wilson’s performance and said: ‘there can seldom have been a statesman of the first rank more incom-
46 petent than the President in the agilities of the council chamber.’ Wilson was prepared to accept the treaty’s
47 harsher terms as he felt that a League of Nations would be able to modify these terms peacefully in time.
48 This optimistic view was not universally shared in the US, though. To idealists, the League of Nations would
49222 be tainted by its association with a selfish and vindictive peace.
Despite this, the harshness of the Treaty of Versailles did not cause most concern in the US where,
after all, in public opinion Germany had been the enemy for the previous two years. The main worry was
the potential of the League of Nations to force binding commitments upon its members. Opposition in
the Senate began months before all of the treaty’s terms were decided, and once the treaty was signed, its
individual flaws were used as a weapon against joining the League. As a result of the 1918 Congressional
elections, the Republicans had a 49/47 majority in the Senate, where a two-thirds majority is required in
order to ratify a treaty. Only 14 of these Republican senators were ‘Irreconcilables’, determined to reject
any form of League of Nations. The rest were ‘strong’ or ‘mild’ ‘Reservationists’, seeking opt-outs for the
US from some of the League’s more binding commitments, but not opposed to the principle of a League.
The Republican Senate majority leader, Henry Cabot Lodge, was a ‘strong Reservationist’ and, like most
of his fellow Republicans, he was also motivated by a personal dislike of Wilson. Lodge, wishing to keep
the support of both the Irreconciliables and the mild Reservationists in his party, embarked upon delaying
tactics to prevent the treaty from being ratified quickly. A ‘Round Robin’ resolution was signed by 39
Republican senators in February 1919, refusing to support the League of Nations if its provisions went
against the Monroe Doctrine. This complicated and slowed negotiations in Paris. Lodge then spent two
weeks of Senate time painstakingly reading every word of the treaty (some 200 pages long) out loud.
Following this, a series of reservations were tabled in the Senate, including Congress’s right to withdraw
the US from the League at any time, no League control over US military commitments, precedence for the
Monroe Doctrine, and so on, totalling fourteen reservations in all.
As a result the treaty was not put to the vote in the Senate until November 1919. Ratification with
the reservations was rejected 55/39, and ratification without reservations was rejected 53–38, with a few
abstentions in either vote. Lodge had successfully mustered the support of virtually all Republicans and a
few Democrats against ratification without reservations; and ratification with reservations was rejected by
most Democrats and a few ‘Irreconciliable’ Republicans. The result was no ratification due to the lack of
consensus over reservations. However, the treaty would be presented for ratification again, and next time
it would be a choice of either the treaty with reservations or no treaty at all. In theory this would have led
to ratification.
Ironically, however, it was Wilson himself who played a key role in the US rejection of the treaty. He
asked the Democrat senators to vote against ratification with reservations when the Senate voted again in
March 1920. The Senate voted 49–35 in favour this time, but this was seven votes short of the two-thirds
majority needed for ratification. This was mainly due to a number of Democrat senators showing loyalty
to Wilson at the expense of the treaty. To understand this we need to look at Wilson’s motives and mis-
management of the Senate. Having chosen to personally lead the US delegation to Paris (and appointing
no leading Republicans to his delegation), Wilson felt his own reputation was tied up with the Treaty of
Versailles in its Paris form. A few minor compromises might be acceptable but one clause that Wilson
would not compromise on was Article 10 of the League of Nations, which provided for the use of collec-
tive force against violation of sovereignty or territorial integrity. This, however, was the clause that worried
Reservationists the most. Rather than seek a deal on the issue Wilson first bluntly rejected criticisms, saying
in June 1919: ‘We ought to either go in or stay out. To stay out would be fatal.’ He then attempted to
appeal to public opinion over the head of the Senate with a whistle-stop lecture tour during September,
but the decision in reality lay with the Senate. However Wilson hated Senate majority leader Lodge as much
as Lodge hated him, and Wilson feared that a treaty ratified with reservations would be seen as a Lodge
achievement, not a Wilson achievement.
Our understanding of the US Senate’s rejection of the treaty is clouded by the illness suffered by Wilson
during 1919 and early 1920. His ill health had weakened his role at the Paris Peace Conference, and
his lecture tour resulted in a major stroke in October 1919. This left him isolated from day-to-day
politics for three months, but he refused to relinquish the Presidency and allowed his wife effectively to
control his decisions. When Secretary of State Lansing tried to govern in Wilson’s absence, Mrs Wilson
ESSAYS • 205
1111 persuaded her husband to dismiss him. It was in this context that Wilson refused to negotiate any deal
2111 on the Treaty of Versailles before the second Senate vote in March 1920. He planned instead to run again
3 for the Presidency and treat the election as a popular referendum on US membership of the League of
4111 Nations. This was unrealistic judgement. However, there is no evidence of Wilson preparing to compro-
5 mise with the Republicans in the Senate before his stroke. The identification of Republican opposition with
6 the leadership of Lodge probably did more to cause Wilson’s stubborn approach than his illness.
7 It was a peculiar chain of circumstances, then, that led to the US’s rejection of the Treaty of Versailles.
8 (The US would eventually sign a separate peace treaty with Germany under President Harding.) The fear
9 of binding military commitment was the main sticking point, but, in the event, the League never demanded
10111 this level of commitment. As all of the League’s leading members bypassed the League and used more tradi-
1 tional diplomatic methods when it suited them, the US’s refusal to join arguably made little difference to
2 US foreign policy or world peace generally. Successive Presidents after Wilson showed no interest in recon-
3 sidering US membership of the League. This contrasts with the US’s commitment to the United Nations
4 after the Second World War, suggesting that the lack of threat to the US after the First World War (unlike
5 the Second World War) meant that the arguments for accepting the treaty and joining the League were
6 not urgent or strong enough when placed alongside the arguments against.
7
8
9
Isolationism in the 1920s and 1930s
20111
1
(b) ‘Isolationism’ refers to the refusal of the United States to join the League of Nations in the 1920s or
2
enter binding alliances to counter the threat of the dictators in the 1930s. Compared to the post-1941
3
period, the US was certainly isolated in the 1920s and 1930s; however there was still plenty of interest in
4
world affairs and various conferences and treaties. The US was never truly isolationist, just relatively so
5
during this period. Isolationism deepened in the 1930s as new reasons for avoiding commitments elsewhere
6
emerged – in particular the impact of the Great Depression.
7
Isolationism towards Europe grew out of the US’s geographical remoteness and lack of regular deal-
8
ings with European powers before the First World War. With the exception of the Algeciras Conference,
9
30 the US only took an interest in European involvement in the Americas, the Pacific and East Asia, and only
1 entered the war in 1917 after provocation from German unrestricted submarine warfare. The impact of
2 the war upon the US, while economically beneficial, did carry a heavy human cost compared to previous
3 US conflicts. Involvement in the war was viewed as a mistake during the 1920s and 1930s, and although
4 the US came close to joining the League of Nations in 1920, once the decision was made not to join, public
5 opinion was galvanised into hostility to the League. From its own perspective, the US seemed better placed
6 away from ‘Old World’ squabbling, the creation of the League was linked to a vindictive and punitive treaty
7 and the French occupation of the Ruhr in 1923 seemed to confirm that European powers had not learned
8 to settle problems peacefully after the war. While the US kept an eye on the League and even had an
9 agent in Geneva to communicate the US’s views to League officials, public opinion opposed involvement.
40 Joseph C. Grew, US ambassador to Switzerland, tried to steer clear of the League’s headquarters and was
1 horrified when, calling in briefly to pick up a friend in September 1922, he was caught by a Chicago Tribune
2 reporter, suspecting secret US government dealings with the League. Grew was relieved when the story
3 was not printed, but his alarm shows the unacceptability of the League to the US.
4 Successive Republican Presidents in the 1920s maintained this isolated approach and Harding’s elec-
45 tion victory in 1920 seemed to confirm public hostility to the League. Harding said in March 1921 the US
46 was ‘confident of our ability to work out our own destiny’. Republican foreign policy in the 1920s has been
47 described as ‘conservative internationalism’. The US did deal with other powers and seek international
48 agreements, but on its own terms and in areas of its own interests only. The Monroe Doctrine remained
49222 a guiding principle, with US activity in Latin America continuing throughout the 1920s, but interest in
European affairs fell away. President Coolidge defined this approach to foreign policy accurately in 1925,
stating: ‘We can best serve our country and most successfully discharge our obligations to humanity by
continuing to be openly and candidly, intensely and scrupulously, American.’ This approach expressed itself
in a rather half-hearted global policy in the 1920s. The Washington Treaty of 1922 saw the five largest
naval powers agree limits on battleship tonnage, while the 1928 Kellogg-Briand Pact to condemn war was
eventually signed by 62 states. The 1924 Dawes Plan and 1929 Young Plan, arranged by Hoover as Secretary
of Commerce and then President, showed US involvement in the German reparations issue. However, the
Washington Treaty did not stop the building of heavy cruisers and submarines, and was obsolete by the
1930s. The Kellogg-Briand Pact has to be offset by the US’s failure to join the World Court in the Hague
(ratification of membership failed as the Senate, then individual states of the US, tried to attach an endless
stream of reservations). And the reparations plans were motivated by US economic interests; Britain and
France needed German reparations in order to pay off US loans from the First World War. A general suspi-
cion of international commitments and a succession of Presidents more concerned with domestic issues
led to a rather languid foreign policy in the 1920s.
The Great Depression of the early 1930s led to a surge in isolationism and renewed suspicion of foreign
commitments. By 1931 the Depression was so deep and apparently unstoppable that foreign concerns
became insignificant compared to domestic problems. Even Roosevelt’s election victory over Hoover in
1932 was accompanied by a promise that the US would concentrate on domestic solutions to domestic
problems, rather than blaming the worldwide depression and looking for international solutions. This
attitude was demonstrated at the World Economic Conference in London in June 1933: the US dele-
gates did not even agree among themselves as to what they wanted from the conference, and a proposed
return to fixed exchange rates based on the gold standard was rejected by the US, dooming the conference
to failure.
Public opinion, substantially pro-isolation in the 1920s, now became vehemently so, crossing all social
and political boundaries: isolationism was led by pacifist groups such as the Women’s International League
for Peace and Freedom and the Council for the Prevention of War; there was intellectual support blaming
US involvement in the First World War upon greedy munitions manufacturers; famous individuals such
as Albert Einstein and Charles Lindbergh promoted isolationism; and the Hearst newspaper group led press
hostility to foreign affairs. An opinion poll from April 1937 suggested that 64 per cent saw involvement in
the First World War as a mistake. This widespread attitude has been called ‘insulationist’ rather than truly
isolationist, but it was still far in excess of attitudes in the early 1920s. Additionally, all European states,
except Finland, defaulted on their war debts to the US in the early 1930s and US trade interests in Europe
nose-dived at the same time.
Congress now passed a series of laws to maintain isolationism and avoid a repeat of the First World
War involvement. The Nye Committee investigated the munitions industry during 1934–6 and con-
demned it for encouraging intervention in the last war. Meanwhile the 1934 Johnson Amendment forbade
the sale of bonds for any European power that had previously defaulted on US loans. This was followed
by the 1935 Pittman Resolution that forbade US Presidents from applying sanctions that discriminated
in favour of victims of aggression. Then a series of Neutrality Acts from 1935 to 1937 banned arms
exports to belligerents, war loans or credits, and US citizens travelling on belligerent ships, with the same
restrictions to apply to civil wars as well as wars between countries. The 1938 Ludlow Amendment was
only 21 votes short of a House of Representatives two-thirds majority: had it been passed the President
would not have been able to declare war without holding a popular referendum first. This showed how
isolationism was moving towards an extreme. Even as late as November 1939, when the menace of the
dictators was clear to all, Congress was only willing to partially step down from its neutrality stance.
Arms exports would be allowed but only on a ‘cash and carry’ basis; buyers would pay up front and make
their own transport arrangements. This showed that isolationism lingered even after the Second World
War had begun.
ESSAYS • 207
1111 Roosevelt, newly elected President in 1933, had a track record as a Wilsonian internationalist.
2111 He was conscious of the threat of the dictators in the 1930s well before US public opinion seemed to be.
3 However, even his attitudes were influenced by the 1930s Great Depression and he steered clear of foreign
4111 policy debate in the 1932 and 1936 elections, except to make bland statements such as ‘I hate war’ and
5 to describe trade with belligerent powers as ‘fool’s gold’. Roosevelt seems to have stepped away from
6 internationalism during the early 1930s, combining an understandable preoccupation with economic
7 recovery, a wish to go with the tide of public opinion (he referred to it as a ‘very large and perhaps increas-
8 ing school of thought’ in September 1935) and a personal tendency to put off binding decisions in foreign
9 policy. He was also unimpressed by Britain’s ‘imperial preference’ approach at the Ottawa Confer-
10111 ence, where the British Empire put up external trade barriers against US trade. The League of Nations
1 seemed to be losing authority in the early 1930s as first Japan, then Germany (and later Italy) all rejected
2 the League, and a study of Japan’s invasion of Manchuria suggested there was little the US could do about
3 it with or without the League’s help. Even existing US agreements seemed to be failing, the Washington
4 and London naval agreements expiring in 1936 after both Japan and Britain had rejected renewal proposals.
5 By 1937 Roosevelt was trying to educate public opinion into recognising the threat of the dictators,
6 but concluded that the US was not ready to accept binding commitments in foreign policy just yet. The
7 President’s rhetoric became more internationalist over the following two years, gradually winning some
8 public support as Japan pursued its invasion of China, but when war broke out Europe in 1939 US neutrality
9 was no surprise.
20111 In conclusion, the reasons for US ‘isolationism’ did change during the 1920s and 1930s, but always
1
seemed to be underpinned by the belief that the US had no part to play in ‘Old World’ diplomatic intrigue.
2
Such intrigue had led to the tragic First World War. As was the case in the European democracies, the
3
effects of world war and then the Great Depression led to an upsurge of pacifism and distrust of binding
4
international commitments. The US was not the only country to reject the League of Nations or fail to face
5
up to the threat of the dictators during this period and in many respects the US was no more isolated or
6
neutral than some other major powers. It was its refusal to join the League and the wave of 1930s neutralism
7
that gave the US an isolationist image between the world wars.
8
9
30
1 The abandonment of isolationism in 1941
2
3 5 Why did the US abandon isolationism in 1941? (45)
4 (OCR)
5
6 The United States had no option but to enter the Second World War in December 1941. First Japan, without
7 declaring war, launched a surprise attack upon the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, then Germany declared
8 war on the US a few days later. This gives the image of a supine, neutral US dragged into world war against
9 its will. In reality isolationism was always an overstatement of the US position in world affairs, and the
40 whole of 1941, not just December, saw growing US involvement in the war. This was caused not just by
1 the aggressive nature of Japan and Germany demonstrated before 1939, but also by the way the war had
2 progressed up to 1941.
3 President Roosevelt, who led the US into the war, had also presided over an isolationist US during the
4 1930s. His instincts were internationalist, though, and he felt warm personal ties to Britain and France since
45 his experience of the First World War. By 1939 Germany, Italy and Japan, the Axis powers, had already
46 shown their aggressive ambitions. Developments such as the German annexation of Austria and the
47 Czechoslovakian Sudetenland, the Italian conquest of Abyssinia, and the Japanese invasion of China demon-
48 strated this aggression. They also showed the failure of the League of Nations, and Britain and France’s
49222 policy of appeasement, to deal with this aggression. With fascists apparently winning the Spanish Civil War,
and all dictatorships building up formidable military power, Roosevelt recognised that by 1939 the US faced
a dangerous world. This was confirmed in April 1939 when Germany contemptuously rejected the US’s
request for assurance that 31 named countries would not be attacked in the next ten years. So, despite
public opposition to war running at around 80 per cent from 1939 to late 1941, Roosevelt warned Congress
in January 1939 to pay close attention to international developments, then allowed the sale of thousands
of US aeroplanes to France and warned Japan that, unless they ceased aggression against China, the US
would cancel their trade treaties with Japan in January 1940. The US was beginning to play power politics
again before the Second World War broke out in Europe.
Despite Roosevelt’s pointed references in January 1940 to ostriches sticking their heads in the sand,
the US was still unlikely to intervene while the existing balance of power existed in Europe. Arms were sold
to Britain and France, but only on a ‘cash and carry’ basis; the Allies had to pay up front and trans-
port the arms from the US themselves. The dramatic German success in 1940 changed that. With Poland
conquered the previous autumn, Germany then had overrun Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium,
Luxembourg and, most significantly, France by June 1940 – and France had been seen as the European
country most likely to defeat Germany. This success was complemented by an effective German U-boat
campaign. By the summer, the British Empire seemed very vulnerable to German and Japanese attack.
Elsewhere in Europe, Germany had the friendship of Italy, Spain and the USSR, which had signed a ten-
year non-aggression pact with Germany in August 1939 and had then gone on to invade eastern Poland
and attack Finland during 1939–40. The European balance of power had clearly failed to regulate itself
without US involvement. The balance of power in Southeast Asia was, as a result, also threatened, where
French, Dutch and British colonies were Japanese targets. US security seemed to be dangerously under-
mined. If the British Empire was to fall, then US security would be shattered. With this in mind, and
encouraged by election victory in 1940 despite ‘warmonger’ accusations from his opponents, Roosevelt
persuaded Congress to reluctantly introduce conscription in September 1940 and then a ‘lend-lease’ scheme
in January 1941, allowing Britain to receive US military aid on credit. A Presidential radio broadcast in
December 1940 outlined Roosevelt’s wish for the US to become the ‘arsenal of democracy’, providing muni-
tions to the Allies. The US was now showing a similar level of pro-Allied commitment to that of 1915–16,
possibly greater.
It was US relations with Japan, however, that really pulled it away from isolationism. Rivalry over East
Asia and the Pacific had existed since the late nineteenth century. Mutual tensions had generally been settled
through diplomacy, for example the 1922 Washington Treaty. However, the 1930s saw a surge in Japanese
imperial expansion, motivated partly by a lack of raw materials and land, its overpopulation and a loss of
world markets due to the worldwide Great Depression. Less than 5 per cent of US foreign investments were
in China but the market there had massive potential. This, coupled with US territorial possessions in the
Pacific (notably the Philippines) made a future clash of interests likely. Japan certainly perceived this to be
so, and the US ambassador Joseph Grew said in May 1933: ‘the Japanese fighting forces consider the United
States as their potential enemy.’ However, before 1937 war seemed unlikely.
The US built up its naval strength during the 1930s but did not break any treaty doing so. The Japanese
conquest of Manchuria led to US trade there tripling between 1932 and 1940, showing the lack of disrup-
tion this caused to US/Japanese relations. Even the full Japanese invasion of China in 1937 did not lead to
any determined US response or even a show of naval strength. When a US gunboat was bombed and sunk
off the Chinese coast, the Japanese offer of an apology and reparations was accepted. And the 1934 Tydings-
McDuffie Act, which promised independence for the Philippines in twelve years, suggested that the US was
looking to reduce, rather than increase, its involvement in the western Pacific. As with Europe, it was the
changing picture in 1940 that proved to be a turning point in US foreign policy.
By the end of 1940, the US had imposed embargoes on trade and credit with Japan. These included
aeroplanes and aviation parts, aviation and motor fuel and lubricants, followed by a total embargo and the
freezing of Japanese assets in the US in July 1941. These economic sanctions hit Japan hard, its lack of raw
ESSAYS • 209
1111 materials making it dependent on US exports for its own war effort. Despite this, there were still hopes of
2111 lasting peace between the US and Japan. Between January and June 1941, Secretary of State Hull embarked
3 on a series of talks with the Japanese ambassador to the US, Nomura. The Japanese decision not to join in
4111 Germany’s invasion of the USSR in May 1941 was also a promising sign that Japanese expansion might
5 have limits, and might be deterred by the US threat. However the Japanese invasion of southern Indo-
6 China (a French colony) in July 1941, and the stiffening of US sanctions as a result, was a point of no
7 return. Control of Indo-China would put Japan in a position to control the whole of Southeast Asia and
8 the western Pacific. It would also isolate Britain from its empire resources in Asia. The US, having seen
9 Germany win dominance of Europe the previous year, could not see Japan achieve a similar level of domin-
10111 ance in East Asia. The Japanese, for their part, by a process of ‘circular reasoning’ now coveted the Dutch
1 East Indies for its oil resources, even though a Japanese invasion would be almost certain to provoke a US
2 declaration of war. As the oil would be needed to win a war against the US, this justified such an invasion.
3 Japan made an arguably token attempt to avert war in November 1941 by offering to withdraw from
4 southern Indo-China if the US lifted its economic sanctions against Japan. This proved to be the final peace
5 initiative before war broke out.
6 The Japanese initiative was weak in any case, but its failure can be partly explained by the more resolute
7 attitude shown by the US during 1941. The US still wanted to avoid war but, learning lessons from the
8 failure of appeasement in the 1930s, refused to compromise with Japanese aggression. Roosevelt identified
9 the US’s future prospects more and more closely with the survival of the British Empire. The alternative
20111 seemed to be an isolated US in an Axis-dominated world. Secretary of War Stimson had (inaccurately)
1
calculated that defeat for Britain would leave the Axis with naval superiority of seven to one and resulting
2
dominance of world trade. A secret meeting between Roosevelt and Churchill off the Newfoundland coast
3
led to the joint signing of the Atlantic Charter, where both agreed on shared principles and condemnation
4
of Nazi tyranny, and agreed to work closely together in the future, for example in sending aid to the USSR.
5
Any lingering US neutrality was further undermined by German U-boat attacks on US destroyers Greer,
6
Kearny and Reuben James during September and October. There were now parallels with the First World
7
War in early 1917, with Germany apparently winning the war and US ships under attack. In this context,
8
the strong US response to the Japanese offer in November 1941 was unsurprising. The US reply (the ‘Hull
9
Note’) demanded that Japan withdraw from China as well as Indo-China before sanctions would be lifted.
30
1 With a more hardline government freshly installed in Japan, this reply was inevitably rejected. Japan now
2 concentrated on making a surprise attack on the US at Pearl Harbor, leaving no time for any further diplo-
3 matic initiatives. The nature of the attack silenced any remaining isolationism in the US and made the
4 declaration of war against Japan a formality. The US did not declare war on Germany immediately but
5 Hitler saved Roosevelt the trouble of persuading Congress to extend the war further by declaring war himself
6 on the US a week later.
7 The US’s abandonment of isolation and entry into the Second World War in 1941 was mainly a reac-
8 tion to the power and aggression of others. Support for neutrality lingered for some time after the nature
9 of the aggressive states had revealed itself. Isolationism seemed to have served the US well when power
40 elsewhere in the world was either balanced or tipped in favour of states friendly towards the US. By 1941
1 this was no longer the case. Nor was it the case in the late 1940s when the US, faced with the emergence
2 of the USSR as an unfriendly superpower, opted not to return to inter-war isolationism but instead to
3 retain its presence in Europe and East Asia. US foreign policy changed for the most fundamental reason –
4 the future security of the United States.
45
46
47
48
49222
Part 3: Sources
1 The causes of the Spanish-American War
■ Source A: Senator Henry Cabot Lodge (March 1895)
It is not the policy of the United States to enter, as England has done, upon the general acquisition of
distant possessions in all parts of the world. Our government is not adapted to such a policy, and we have
no need of it, for we have an ample field at home; but at the same time it must be remembered that while
in the United States themselves we hold the citadel of our power and greatness as a nation, there are
outworks essential to the defence of that citadel which must neither be neglected nor abandoned.
■ Source B: President Grover Cleveland (December 1896)
The spectacle of the utter ruin of an adjoining country, by nature one of the most fertile and charming on
the globe, would engage the serious attention of the government and people of the United States in any
circumstances. In point of fact, they have a concern with it which is by no means of a wholly sentimental
or philanthropic character. It lies so near to us as to be hardly separated from our territory. Our actual
pecuniary interest in it is second only to that of the people and government of Spain.
■ Source C: President William McKinley (December 1897)
The story of Cuba for many years has been one of unrest, growing discontent, an effort toward a larger
enjoyment of liberty and self-control, of organised resistance to the mother country, of depression after
distress and warfare and of ineffectual settlement to be followed by renewed revolt. For no ending period
. . . has the condition of Cuba or the policy of Cuba not caused concern to the United States . . . If it shall
hereafter appear to be a duty imposed by our obligations to ourselves, to civilisation and humanity, to
intervene with force, it shall be without fault on our part and only because the necessity for such action
will be so clear as to command the support and approval of the civilised world.
AQA QUESTION FORMAT
The questions and answers that follow are based on the AQA style.
(a) Study Source A. Using your own knowledge explain what steps the US had taken to acquire
overseas territory by the 1890s. (3)
(b) Study Sources A and B and use your own knowledge to support your answer. Explain the
role of economic factors in US foreign expansion by the end of the nineteenth century. (7)
(c) Study sources A, B and C and use your own knowledge. How important was Spain’s
treatment of Cuban rebels in causing the Spanish-American War in 1898? (15)
(a) US expansion before the 1890s mainly consisted of pushing its frontier westwards. It consciously
rejected the British style of empire, namely ‘the general acquisition of distant possessions in all parts of the
world’. However one point not mentioned in the Source was that the US had acquired the ‘distant posses-
sions’ of Alaska and Midway in 1867. The Source also fails to mention the economic colonialism taking
place in the Americas and the Pacific, for example Hawaii where US businesses controlled sugar produc-
tion. When Lodge referred to ‘outworks essential to the defence of that citadel’ he had US economic fortunes
in mind. While the US had acquired little overseas territory by 1895, this was no longer the case by 1900.
SOURCES • 211
1111 (b) Economic factors were central to US foreign expansion in the late nineteenth century. In Source B
2111 Cleveland is honest enough to say that US alarm at Spain’s repression of Cuba in 1896 is ‘by no means of
3 a wholly sentimental or philanthropic character’, but there is also a ‘pecuniary interest’. Once you cut
4111 through the moral outrage and the vacuous assurance that this would merit ‘serious attention . . . in any
5 circumstances’, the economic concerns are clear. There is also significant reference to the strategic import-
6 ance of Cuba, as ‘it lies so near’ to the US, echoing Lodge’s warning in Source A that ‘there are outworks
7 necessary to the defence of that citadel which must neither be neglected nor abandoned’. It is likely that
8 Cuba was in Lodge’s mind too. We can therefore establish from the Sources alone that economic factors,
9 while very important, were not the only considerations for the US.
10111 In fact the US, having been born out of a successful attempt to throw off British domination, had been
1 motivated from a wish to prevent European encroachment upon US interests throughout the nineteenth
2 century. A second defeat of Britain in war in 1812 was followed by the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, which
3 declared all of the Americas (North, Central and South) to be a US sphere of interest and not for further
4 European expansion. This doctrine was in practice extended to include much of the Pacific. The most
5 significant US foreign expansion came in 1898 when the Treaty of Paris gave the US control of Puerto Rico,
6 Guam and the Philippines, all former Spanish colonies. This was a consequence of the US’s efforts to remove
7 Spanish influence in and around the Americas, more a strategic than an economic decision.
8 It is also worth mentioning the surge of interest in Social Darwinism that, in theory, made it the US’s
9 destiny to dominate its continent and the surrounding oceans. The growing US navy was nicknamed the
20111 ‘Great White Fleet’ in 1893 and the tone of Lodge’s pronouncement in Source A, of ‘our power and great-
1 ness as a nation’, implies a similar level of confidence and ambition that could lead to territorial expansion.
2 However, the US clearly stood to benefit economically from any foreign expansion as it would open
3 up new markets for trade. An obvious example of economic factors causing US foreign expansion can be
4 found in the case of Hawaii. Since 1819, US settlers had carved out a share of the Hawaiian economy and
5 by 1892 they controlled about two-thirds of all property there. When Queen Liliuokalani tried to reduce
6 US economic influence, the US simply annexed Hawaii on the pretext that law and order was breaking
7 down. Economic factors seemed still to be predominant in US foreign expansion by the end of the nine-
8 teenth century, and would remain a strong influence in the twentieth century.
9
30 (c) Successive US Presidents in the 1890s made clear their outrage at Spain’s treatment of Cuba. In Source
1 B Cleveland bemoans ‘the spectacle of the utter ruin of an adjoining country’, while in Source C McKinley
2 contemplates ‘a duty imposed by our obligations . . . to civilisation and humanity, to intervene with force’.
3 Both statements were made in the aftermath of the 1895 Cuban uprising and are likely to refer specifically
4 to the Spanish suppression of the rebellion in the years that followed as well as more general distaste for
5 the way that Spain had ruled Cuba before 1895. Spain was certainly brutal in its suppression of the revolt,
6 and its deployment of nearly 200,000 troops to Cuba over the next three years was accompanied by stories
7 of violent atrocities against the Cuban population. Violent repression of colonial uprisings was nothing
8 new but was now taking place ‘so near to us as to be hardly separated from our territory’ (Source B). Much
9 of the US press picked up on the repression and reported atrocities in detail, provoking anti-Spanish outrage
40 among the US population. This could not be ignored by the US government and was a major factor in
1 causing the 1898 war.
2 The way in which Spain chose to deal with the rebellion – with utter intolerance rather than attempting
3 to find a compromise or peaceful solution – helps to explain why war broke out in 1898. Spain was in no
4 mood to bow to US pressure over Cuba. Spanish repression continued through 1896 and 1897 into 1898
45 in the face of US protests; and a leaked letter, written by the Spanish ambassador to the US, de Lome,
46 seemed to indicate Spanish contempt for the US President McKinley. McKinley himself was scathing about
47 Spanish rule in Cuba, as indicated in his accusations in Source C of ‘distress and warfare and of ineffec-
48 tual settlement’, and his implication that Spain was not part of ‘the civilised world’. He had also pledged
49222 support for Cuban independence in his 1896 election campaign. Such comments would have enraged Spain
and made war hard to avoid. De Lome’s letter continued this process, especially as it was angrily paraded
in the US press in February 1898.
It was not only the nature of Spain’s treatment of Cuban rebels but also the proximity of Cuba to the
US and the aims of US foreign policy that prompted US intervention. When Lodge spoke of ‘outworks
essential to the defence of that citadel’ (Source A) he would have had Cuba, less than one hundred miles
from Florida, in mind. While the US might not seek ‘the general acquisition of distant possessions in all
parts of the world’ (Source A), Cuba could hardly be considered distant. The US had already annexed
Midway and Alaska in recent decades and was soon to take full control of Hawaii. US foreign policy adhered
to the 1823 Monroe Doctrine and considered the Americas to be their business, not that of European
powers. At a time when other European powers were looking to expand their empires (for example the
‘scramble for Africa’) the US was especially determined not to allow an increase in European influence in
the Caribbean, not even from an incumbent colonial power such as Spain.
While the factors above contributed to the outbreak of war, a specific development in February 1898
triggered the conflict. The US battleship Maine was blown up by a mine in Havana harbour resulting in
260 deaths. Whether the mine was planted by the Spanish or by Cuban rebels is unproven but the US press
blamed Spain and encouraged public opinion to demand action. Congress was caught up in the mood of
the time and approved an extra $50 million on national defence, and McKinley, conscious of the immi-
nent mid-term elections and wishing to prove his own backbone, authorised US military intervention in
April 1898. This made war inevitable; it was likely to break out in 1898 in any case and the sinking of the
Maine increased this likelihood.
The US had a special economic and strategic interest in Cuba. In 1898, as in the 1962 missile crisis, it
would not tolerate any developments there that were harmful to US interests. Colonial repression of native
populations might be acceptable (and did take place without response from the US) in Africa or Asia, but
not in ‘Uncle Sam’s backyard’.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
(a) Study Source B. Using your own knowledge explain President Cleveland’s reference
to ‘the spectacle of the utter ruin of an adjoining country.’ (3)
(b) Study Sources B and C. What factors led to the US intervention in Cuba in April 1898?
Use your own knowledge to support your answer. (7)
(c) Study Sources A, B and C and use your own knowledge. To what extent did the US
assert its influence over the Americas between 1890 and 1914? (15)
(AQA)
2 Arguments for neutrality in the First World War
■ Source A: President Woodrow Wilson, August 1914
The people of the United States are drawn from many nations, and chiefly from the nations now at war.
It is natural and inevitable that there should be the utmost variety of sympathy and desire among them
with regards to the issues and circumstances of the conflict. Some will wish one nation, others another,
to succeed in the momentous struggle. It will be easy to excite passion and difficult to allay it. . . . Such
divisions among us would be fatal to our peace of mind and might seriously stand in the way of the proper
performance of our duty as the one great nation at peace, the one people holding itself ready to play a
part of impartial mediation and speak the counsels of peace and accommodation, not as a partisan but as
a friend.
SOURCES • 213
1111 ■ Source B: Theodore Roosevelt, September 1914

2111
3 All of us on this continent ought to appreciate how fortunate we are that we of the Western world have
4111 been free from the working of the causes which have produced the bitter and vindictive hatred among the
5 great military powers of the Old World. We owe this immunity primarily to the policies grouped together
6 under the title of the Monroe Doctrine. . . . Neutrality may be of prime necessity in order to preserve our
7 own interests, to maintain peace in so much of the world as is not affected by the war; and to conserve
8 our influence for helping towards the re-establishment of general peace when the time comes.
9
10111 ■ Source C: Senator George W. Norris (April 1917)
1
2 No close student of recent history will deny that both Great Britain and Germany have, on numerous occa-
3 sions since the beginning of the war, flagrantly violated in the most serious manner the rights of neutral
4 vessels and neutral nations under existing international law, as recognised up to the beginning of this war
5 by the civilised world. . . . Our government has officially declared both of them to be illegal and has offi-
6 cially protested against both of them. The only difference is that in the case of Germany we have persisted
7 in our protest, while in the case of England we have submitted.
8
9
20111 AQA QUESTION FORMAT
1
2
3
(a) Study Source B and use your own knowledge. Explain what was meant by the Monroe
4
Doctrine. (3)
5
6 (b) Study Sources A and B and use your own knowledge. Why did the US choose neutrality
7 when war broke out in Europe in August 1914? (7)
8
(c) Study Sources A, B and C and use your own knowledge. Explain why, despite arguments
9
30 for neutrality and both Great Britain and Germany breaching international law, the US
1 entered the war on the side of the Allies in April 1917. (15)
2
3 (a) The Monroe Doctrine, presented by President James Monroe to Congress in 1823, was a declaration
4 that the Americas were in the US sphere of interest and that any attempts by European powers to increase
5 their colonial empires there would be resisted. This had been a specific response to Spain’s attempts to win
6 back its South American colonies but was retained and consistently followed over the next century. Source
7 B shows Roosevelt upholding the doctrine as late as 1914. He praises the doctrine for keeping the US ‘free
8 from . . . the bitter and vindictive hatred among the great military powers of the Old World’, i.e. the outbreak
9 of the First World War in Europe. Here we see a fresh interpretation of the doctrine; as Europe is outside
40 the US sphere of interest the US should take a neutral stance.
1
2 (b) There would have been logic behind any US decision to enter the war in 1914. The US economy relied
3 heavily upon European trade and many US citizens were of European ancestry. Woodrow Wilson noted:
4 ‘The people of the United States are drawn from many nations, and chiefly from the nations now at war
45 . . . it would be easy to excite passion’ (Source A). The US could not ignore what was happening in Europe
46 and even supporters of neutrality such as Theodore Roosevelt saw the need ‘to conserve our influence’ in
47 European affairs (Source B).
48 Despite this, Europe was 3,000 miles away and Roosevelt’s contrasting of ‘the Western world’ with ‘the
49222 Old World’ would have met with popular agreement in 1914 America. He mentions the ‘Monroe Doctrine’
and its implication that the US should only concern itself with the Americas and not Europe. European
power politics and empire- and alliance-building disgusted Roosevelt who saw them as ‘the causes which
have produced this bitter and vindictive hatred’. There did not seem to be any justification for the war,
instead it was a European malaise – and neutrality seemed the best way to keep it from spreading to the
Americas. This seemed to be supported by US public opinion at the time.
While the majority of US citizens who felt a preference were inclined to support the Allies, there were
many German immigrants, Irish Americans (who resented Britain) and Jewish Americans (including
refugees from persecution in Russia) in the US. Woodrow Wilson acknowledged it as ‘natural and inevitable
that there should be the utmost variety of sympathy . . . some will wish one nation, others another, to
succeed in the momentous conflict’. Intervention in the war might lead to ‘divisions among us’ that ‘would
be fatal to our peace of mind’. Anti-war demonstrations, violent disagreements and riots were all possible
consequences of taking sides.
It was also unclear how long the war would last for, and any US intervention on one side or the other
would take several months to have any effect. Not only might the US support the losing side, it would lose
the credibility needed ‘for helping towards the re-establishment of general peace when the time comes’
(Source B). The idea of the US as ‘the one great nation at peace, the one people holding itself ready to play
a part of impartial mediation and speak the counsels of peace and accommodation’ (Source A) was close
to the President’s heart and was reflected in his ‘Fourteen Points’ peace initiative in 1918. Neutrality certainly
seemed to be the most attractive option in 1914, at least for the time being.
(c) The benefits of neutrality were undermined by 1917. Senator Norris (Source C) refers to the behav-
iour of Great Britain and Germany, two leading participants in the First World War. Both had ‘flagrantly
violated in the most serious manner the rights of neutral vessels and neutral nations’ on ‘numerous occa-
sions since the beginning of the war’, two-and-a-half years earlier. US hopes of maintaining its trade with
Germany and Austria-Hungary had been confounded by British naval power in the Atlantic, which used
a ‘stop and search’ policy to blockade the transportation of goods to the Central Powers. The German high
seas fleet never won control of the seas but German U-boats were able to disrupt trade between the US
and Britain and France by attacking shipping. US ships and citizens were affected as Germany introduced
unrestricted submarine warfare in 1915 and again in 1917. The longer war continued, the longer US trade
would be disrupted.
Norris does make it clear, however, that both sides had broken ‘international law’ and that the US
‘government has officially declared both of them to be illegal and has officially protested against both of
them’. The US could not ignore the continued conflict, but any intervention in the war would have to be
on one side or the other. There were long-standing arguments to remain impartial, Woodrow Wilson
warning of ‘divisions among us’ (Source A) and Theodore Roosevelt of ‘the need to preserve our own inter-
ests’. These statements had been made in 1914 however. In private Wilson admitted weeks later that
‘England is fighting our fight’ and, despite promising continued neutrality in his 1916 re-election campaign,
he told his navy Secretary: ‘Any little German lieutenant can put us into the war at any time by some calcu-
lated outrage.’ Roosevelt, having initially supported neutrality, spent much of the next three years
campaigning for the US to enter the war.
As the war dragged through 1915 and 1916, US intervention became more likely. US bankers in 1915
warned of economic recession and the government’s response, given the blockade on its trade with the
Central Powers, was to increase its trade with the Allies. This gave the US a vested interest in Allied victory.
In any case Wilson believed that a victory for the Central Powers could lead to German domination of
Europe and thus a threat to the US’s world position. An Allied victory seemed more likely to keep the
status quo. Germany, furious with the US’s trade with the Allies, introduced unrestricted submarine warfare
– in the eyes of the US this was a ‘flagrant violation’ (Source C). At the same time, Britain maintained its
naval blockade but also took careful diplomatic steps to encourage US trade and warned that the Allies
depended on the US to avoid defeat in the war. In 1916 the British Foreign Secretary Grey proposed a
1111 ceasefire and a retreat to August 1914 positions in Europe, knowing this would be rejected by Germany.
2111 The result was that Wilson, keen to see an end to the war, saw Germany as the more belligerent and
3 intractable power.
4111 This increasing US alignment with the Allies helps to explain Norris’s complaint in Source C ‘that in
5 the case of Germany we have persisted in our protest, while in the case of England we have submitted’.
6 His comment was accurate and reflected that true US neutrality had ended before April 1917. As long as
7 the war continued, US intervention on the side of the Allies was becoming increasingly likely: that this
8 intervention came in April 1917 can be explained by the reintroduction of unrestricted submarine warfare
9 by Germany in January 1917. The US immediately broke off diplomatic relations and a spate of attacks on
10111 US merchant shipping in March 1917 provoked public fury, as had the publication of the ‘Zimmerman
1 Telegram’ in the previous month. Norris was right to say that ‘no close student of recent history will
2 deny that both Great Britain and Germany’ had disrupted US trade in violation of ‘international law’.
3 However, most US citizens had not studied recent history as closely as Norris, it seemed to be Germans
4 rather than Britons killing Americans in the Atlantic, and the German Foreign Minister who was trying to
5 provoke a Mexican attack on the US – in violation of the ‘Monroe Doctrine’ that Roosevelt valued so highly
6 (Source B). For different reasons it was intervention in the war on the side of the Allies that seemed
7 ‘of prime necessity in order to preserve our own interests’.
8
9
20111 ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
1 (a) Study Source C and use your own knowledge. Explain what senator Norris meant by ‘both
2 Great Britain and Germany have . . . flagrantly violated . . . international law’. (3)
3
4 (b) Study Sources A and B and use your own knowledge. What steps did Woodrow Wilson take
5 to carry out ‘our duty . . . to play a part of impartial mediation’ during 1914–19? (7)
6 (c) Study Sources A, B and C and use your own knowledge. Explain why the US remained
7 neutral in The First World War for so long. (15)
8
9
30
1
2
3 1 Assessing US Presidents in foreign policy
4
5 Using the information in this chapter and the further reading, attempt an assessment of one or more of
6 the following US Presidents in foreign policy:
7
8 • Theodore Roosevelt
9 • Woodrow Wilson
40 • Franklin D. Roosevelt
1
2 Draw up a list of their successes and failures. Which was the most successful of the three?
3
4 [After reading the next chapter you could also try making the same assessment for Truman, Eisenhower,
45 Kennedy, Nixon and Reagan. Who do you think was the most successful twentieth-century US President
46 for foreign policy? This would work well as a class ‘balloon debate’. Each President should be represented
47 by one member of the class who gives a speech explaining why not they, but one of the others should be
48 thrown out of a hot air balloon. This should lead to both Presidential strengths and weaknesses being
49222 considered.]
2 The extent of change in US foreign policy, 1890–1941
Draw up a table with two headings: (i) continuity and (ii) change. Taking 1890 as your starting point,
choose one of the following foreign policy areas and list the evidence of continuity or change during this
period:
• US involvement in Latin America

• US involvement in the Far East
• US involvement in Europe
• US participation in international diplomacy
C.J. Bartlett, The Rise and Fall of the Pax Americana, Elek Patrick Renshaw, America in the Era of the Two World
(1974). Wars 1910–1945, Longman (1996).
Peter Brett, The USA and the World, 1917–45, Hodder & Arnold S. Rice and John A. Krout, United States History
Stoughton (1997). from 1865, 20th edition, Harper Collins (1991).
Richard D. Challener (ed.), From Isolation to Containment Robert D. Schulzinger, US Diplomacy since 1900, 5th
1921–1952, Edward Arnold (1970). edition, Oxford University Press (2002).
Akira Iriye, The Globalising of America 1913–1945, John Traynor, Mastering Modern United States History,
Cambridge University Press (1993). Palgrave (2001).
Walter LaFeber, The American Search for Opportunity
1865–1913, Cambridge University Press (1993).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 9
5
6
7
8
9 Foreign Policy, 1941–2001
10111
1
2 Second World War to Détente
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111 This chapter will consider a period when US foreign policy took on greater significance in
1 the minds of politicians and the public than ever before. For the first time since the eight-
2 eenth century the United States felt directly threatened by foreign powers, first Japan and
3 then, for a far longer period, the USSR. A succession of US Presidents placed foreign policy
4
at the top of their priorities, finally abandoned any notion of isolation in favour of an inter-
5
6 ventionist world view, spent escalating amounts on new military technology, and sent
7 troops into unlikely places to fight the perceived enemy – communism. For the public, a
8 growing fear of communism and nuclear war evolved into a more critical approach to US
9 foreign policy.
30
1
2 Historical background The Cold War in Vietnam and Southeast Asia
3 Public opinion and the Vietnam War
4 From the Second World War to the Cold War, The end and legacy of the Cold War
5 1941–1945
6 The Cold War develops and spreads,
7 1945–1952 Sources
8 Brinkmanship, 1952–1964
9 Defeat and détente, 1965–1980 1 The causes of the Cold War
40 The end of the Cold War, 1980–2001 2 Public opinion and the Vietnam War
1
2
3 Essays Historical skills
4
45 The origins and beginnings of the Cold War 1 Investigating Cold War case studies
46 The development of the Cold War in the 1950s 2 The Cold War and US culture
47 and early 1960s
48 The Cuban missile crisis
49222
Chronology
1941 December Japanese attack on US at Pearl Harbor led to declaration of war,

followed by German declaration of war on the US
1943 November Tehran Conference
1944 June US/British ‘D-Day’ landings in Normandy
1945 February Yalta Conference
1945 April Roosevelt died
May Victory in Europe after Germany’s surrender
July Potsdam Conference
August Atomic bombs exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Japan’s
surrender followed
1947 March Truman Doctrine announced to Congress
June Marshall Plan announced to Congress
July National Security Act created Department of Defense, NSC and CIA
1948 June Start of Berlin blockade (ended April 1949)
1949 May North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) formed
September USSR exploded its first atomic bomb
October China declared itself a communist People’s Republic
1950 February Senator McCarthy made first accusations of communist infiltration
(continued until 1954)
June Start of Korean War (ended July 1953)
1954 July Geneva Accords divided Vietnam at the 17th parallel
US supported the government in South Vietnam thereafter
September South East Asia Treaty Organisation (SEATO) formed
1955 May Warsaw Pact formed
1956 November USSR crushed Hungarian revolution
1957 October Sputnik satellite (first space satellite) launched by USSR
1958 August Taiwan Straits crisis (August–October)
1961 April CIA-backed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba failed
August Berlin Wall erected
1962 October Cuban missile crisis
1963 November Kennedy assassinated
1964 August Gulf of Tonkin Resolution gave Johnson power to proceed with the
Vietnam War without needing support from Congress
1965 March US ground troops arrived in Vietnam
1968 February Tet Offensive in Vietnam
1972 February Nixon made first US Presidential visit to China
May SALT I agreement with USSR
1973 January Paris agreements ended Vietnam War and US involvement
1975 August Helsinki agreements accepted status quo in Europe
1979 June SALT II agreement with USSR (later rejected by Congress)
December USSR invaded Afghanistan
1983 March Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI or ‘Star Wars’) announced
1986 October Reykjavik Summit – disarmament talks stalled over SDI
1987 December INF Treaty between US and USSR
1988 February Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan announced
1111
2111
3
4111 1989 November Fall of Berlin Wall heralded collapse of communism in Eastern
5 Europe
6 1991 Operation Desert Storm launched against Iraq (February),
7 December Gorbachev resigned and communism ended in the USSR
8 1993 US intervention in Somalia
9 1997 US signed Kyoto Accord (rescinded in 2001)
10111 2001 September September 11 tragedy: Al Qaeda terrorist attack on New York
1 (leading indirectly to the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003)
2
3
4
6
7 From the Second World War to the Cold War, 1941–1945
8
9 The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 was not completely unexpected. The US govern-
20111 ment had been expecting some kind of attack for the previous two weeks, and all US commanders in the
1 Pacific had been put on alert. However, Pearl Harbor was under defended due to measures taken to protect
2 other bases. More than 180 US planes, 7 battleships and several other naval vessels were sunk or badly
3 damaged. However, the audacity of the Japanese attack draws attention away from its limited effectiveness
4 and US fighting power in the Pacific remained largely intact. A US declaration of war unsurprisingly
5 followed; more of a surprise was the German and Italian declaration of war against the US a few days later,
6 although Japan, Italy and Germany had been allies since 1937. The US had tremendous resources to fight
7 the world war, but it took some time for the War Production Board, a government agency set up to oversee
8 key industries, to mobilise these resources. Within two years, however, US output was enough to give the
9 Allies a decisive advantage against the Axis powers.
30 The first priority for the US was the Pacific, where Japan initially conquered most of Southeast Asia
1 and the Philippines. The US did not inflict a defeat upon Japan until the Battle of Midway in June 1942,
2 but further victories followed, and by June 1944 the US was launching successful air attacks on Japan itself.
3 In Europe Roosevelt promised Stalin he would open a ‘second front’ by the end of 1942, but was persuaded
4 by Churchill to first regain Allied control of North Africa. An invasion of Italy followed in July 1943, which
5 brought down Mussolini’s government, but was slowed down by German forces moving into the north of
6 the country. By 1943 the US air force was participating in bombing raids on Germany and in June 1944 a
7 land offensive in northern France (‘D-day’) began. A German counter-offensive in late 1944 held up US
8 and British troops, and is one reason why much of central as well as Eastern Europe was under Soviet
9 control by May 1945.
40 The partnership of the US, USSR and Britain during 1941–5 was known as ‘The Grand Alliance’. The
1 Tehran conference in November 1943 was a success and relations between Roosevelt and Stalin were cordial.
2 Roosevelt was re-elected in the 1944 Presidential election and the Yalta Conference of February 1945 was
3 another exercise in goodwill, including an agreement to set up the United Nations. The issue of post-war
4 Europe was not resolved properly, however, with Germany (and Berlin) split into four military occupation
45 zones and no decision beyond that made. Roosevelt died in April and Truman, his successor, was less
46 accommodating to Stalin. More decisions on Europe were made at Potsdam in July, but the conference
47 lacked goodwill. The US ‘Manhattan Project’, a secret programme set up in 1939 to develop an atom bomb,
48 was now complete. Two atom bombs were dropped on Japan in August, forcing immediate Japanese
49222 surrender: the war had been won, but already there were obstacles to post-war peace.
The Cold War develops and spreads, 1945–1952
The second half of 1945 and early part of 1946 were characterised by increasing frustration and anger for
the Truman government as the USSR entrenched itself in Eastern Europe and refused to hold genuinely
free elections. Stalin imposed communist governments upon Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Albania
and, soon afterwards, Czechoslovakia and East Germany. Despite these actions, the USSR, for all its oddi-
ties, had been a strong ally during the Second World War and it was widely thought that the US should
now concern itself with domestic affairs and reduce its military commitment to Europe. Congress was
prepared to criticise the USSR, but reluctant to make America put its money where its mouth was. For this
reason, when Churchill toured the US in 1946 and warned of Soviet aggression, it was not initially well
received. Churchill warned that an ‘Iron Curtain’ had descended upon Europe, with all countries to the
east of the ‘Curtain’ subject to repression and control by the USSR. Truman was inclined to agree and was
hostile in dealings with the USSR’s foreign minister, Molotov. The USSR was unmoved, however, and when
Greece looked under threat in 1947, Truman decided to act. What followed set the tone for US foreign
policy for the next 40 years. Truman declared that the world faced a conflict between freedom and repres-
sion, and that the US must protect freedom wherever it was challenged. This ‘Truman Doctrine’ led initially
to US aid for Greece and Turkey, granted by Congress after a struggle. Many billions of dollars worth of
US financial and military aid would be poured into other countries in the decades to come. The Truman
Doctrine introduced the theory of ‘containment’: The US might not be able to overthrow existing commu-
nist governments, but it could work to prevent communist revolutions elsewhere.
Closely following the Truman Doctrine was the ‘Marshall Plan’, a programme of economic aid to
rebuild war-torn Europe. Congress only agreed to grant this financial aid (and far less than Marshall had
proposed) after the USSR imposed control over Czechoslovakia in early 1948. The USSR then refused to
allow countries under its influence to accept the Marshall Plan. This was used by Truman as evidence of
Soviet repression, and stirred up public opinion against the USSR. It was around this time that the term
‘Cold War’ was used to describe the hostile superpower relations. In June 1948 the USSR, angry at the pres-
ence of Western Allied troops in West Berlin (the USSR occupied all territory east and miles west of Berlin,
except in the city itself), cut off land communications with the west in an attempt to bring all Berlin under
Soviet control. Truman refused to give in and authorised an airlift of supplies to West Berlin. This action
helped him to a narrow re-election victory at home and the USSR eventually climbed down. The result
was a divided Germany and a divided Berlin for 40 years. Truman secured the US’s commitment to Western
Europe through the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949. The USSR’s
response was to reveal it had developed its own
Figure 9.1 The Marshall Plan helping Western atom bomb, and it later went on to form the
Europe Warsaw Pact, a military alliance designed to
Step on it, Doc! counter NATO. The Cold War had frozen into a
permanent stand-off in Europe.
At home anti-communist opinion was start-
ing to get out of hand. Truman had previously en-
couraged this. However, the early 1950s saw an
increasing number of accusations and investiga-
tions against government figures, educators, artists
and scientists who were suspected of having spied
for and spread communism. Alger Hiss, a former
leading civil servant, was found guilty in January
1950 and senator Joseph McCarthy then proceeded
to lead witch-hunts against anyone suspected of
leanings towards the left. Leading figures in the
1111 Truman government, Marshall and Acheson, found themselves under scrutiny. A Security Act was passed,
2111 against Truman’s wishes, to clamp down on troublemakers and the labour movement was purged of
3 communists.
4111 The Truman Doctrine of ‘containment’ also met its first test outside Europe in 1950. China had been
5 ‘lost’ to communism the previous year, as McCarthy and others angrily pointed out. After a four-year civil
6 war, Chairman Mao’s communists had defeated Chiang Kai-Shek’s nationalists, who had been forced to
7 retreat to Taiwan. The US refused to recognise the new communist government and supported Chiang
8 instead. Then, in June 1950, communist North Korea invaded the non-communist South. A policy of
9 containment required the US to protect South Korea, and once United Nations blessing had been sought
10111 (with the USSR conveniently absent in protest against the UN’s refusal to recognise Mao’s government),
1 US troops intervened. South Korea was quickly liberated but, on the advice of General MacArthur, Truman
2 decided to conquer North Korea as well. China then intervened and the war settled into a long and destruc-
3 tive stalemate. The US had extended the Cold War to East Asia as well as Europe, and would pay the price
4 in later decades.
5
6
7 Brinkmanship, 1952–1964
8
9 Truman, under fire for the Korean War stalemate and worn down by McCarthyite suspicion, decided not
20111 to seek re-election in 1952. His nominated successor, Adlai Stevenson, was defeated by the Republican
1 candidate and former Second World War General Dwight ‘Ike’ Eisenhower. Eisenhower argued that
2 containment was not enough: the US should aim for ‘roll-back’ and ‘liberation’ of states from communist
3 control. In reality, Eisenhower mainly followed a policy of containment but did use the Central Intelligence
4 Agency (CIA) to initiate regime change in Iran (1953) and Guatemala (1954). In each case the CIA provided
5 financial and military support for domestic uprisings. Eisenhower’s ‘New Look’ at defence spending reduced
6 conventional arms but increased nuclear spending. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles made most public
7 pronouncements on foreign policy. He used the phrase ‘massive retaliation’ as a warning to the USSR not
8 to spread communism. Dulles is associated with the policy of ‘brinkmanship’ – pushing the USSR to the
9 brink of nuclear war if necessary. He never had the chance to do this with the USSR but took a tough –
30 and successful – line when China threatened Taiwan and its offshore islands of Quemsoy, Matsu and the
1 Tachens in 1953 and 1958. However the 1950s saw the US increasingly alarmed as the USSR first crushed
2 an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956, then launched the first ever space satellite, the Sputnik,
3 in 1957. The rockets that launched space satellites had the potential to become devastating military weapons.
4 The 1960s were to see the US take the space race much more seriously.
5 One of Eisenhower’s first priorities had been to bring the Korean War to a satisfactory end, which he
6 eventually did in July 1953. The US remained involved in East Asian affairs, however, partly due to a wish
7 to build up Japan as a secure non-communist ally, partly through a fear of newly communist China, and
8 partly through a concern not to see ex-colonial states in Southeast Asia slip into communism. Eisenhower
9 believed in the ‘domino theory’, that if one state turned communist, others nearby would follow one by
40 one. The French were forced to abandon their colony of Indo-China (or Vietnam) in 1954. North Vietnam
1 had already turned communist; the US stepped in and, at a conference in Geneva, ensured that South
2 Vietnam would stay separate and non-communist. In the tradition of NATO, the US set up the South East
3 Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to make the non-communist states
4 in Southeast Asia work together. The US also poured aid and, later, military force into South Vietnam.
45 Eisenhower had proved a popular President, and is now thought to have had a greater level of exper-
46 tise and control over foreign affairs than was thought at the time. He was re-elected by a landslide in 1956
47 but was not eligible to run in 1960. His Vice-President, Richard Nixon, lost narrowly to the Democrat John
48 F. Kennedy. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963 and has been elevated to legendary status since, but in fact
49222 his foreign policy record was patchy. Kennedy had been interested in foreign affairs since observing the
failure of appeasement in Britain in the 1930s, and was determined to pursue the Cold War with vigour.
His first year was overshadowed by a failed CIA attempt to overthrow Castro’s communist regime in Cuba,
another stand-off over Berlin, and he had trouble asserting himself against his opposite number, the older
and more experienced Khrushchev. In 1962, however, when the USSR tried to base nuclear missiles in
Cuba, Kennedy stood firm and demanded that the missiles be removed. The world was brought to the
brink of nuclear war but Khrushchev was persuaded to back down and Kennedy was successful. The nuclear
arms race, and Cuba, remained foreign policy concerns but attention switched back first to Europe, where
Kennedy made a famously defiant speech next to the Berlin Wall in 1963, and then to South Vietnam,
where communist agitation was growing. The number of US ‘Green Beret’ military advisers in South
Vietnam swelled to 16,000. Then, to worldwide horror, Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963. His
successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, was determined to carry on Kennedy’s work, in particular to stop commu-
nist insurrection in South Vietnam. After a supposed attack on the US navy by North Vietnam, Johnson
launched air strikes against the North, which would later be followed by the arrival of US troops. Nuclear
war had been averted, but the Vietnam War was about to begin.
Defeat and détente 1965–1980
Johnson, encouraged by a landslide election victory in 1964, launched the ground war in South Vietnam
in 1965. He was confident of a quick and easy victory. However, the war was to drag on for nearly ten
years and end in unquestionable defeat for the United States. This rocked US confidence and overshad-
owed all other aspects of foreign policy. More and more US troops and bombs were thrown into Vietnam
in an attempt to destroy the ‘Viet Cong’, a communist guerrilla army attempting to seize control of South
Vietnam. It was a hard war to evaluate. The US was not trying to conquer new territory, just to clear Viet
Cong forces out of South Vietnam. As these forces were dissipated throughout the country, were not easily
identifiable as communists, and only engaged US troops at times of their choosing, it became a frustrating
operation. The US certainly killed large numbers of Viet Cong but did not ever know how many soldiers
they were facing, so victory never seemed close. The Viet Cong also inflicted some bloody defeats upon the
US and, in February 1968, rose up all over South Vietnam to attack US forces. This operation, known as
the ‘Tet Offensive’, was a break from normal Viet Cong tactics and did not, in military terms, succeed for
them. However, the psychological impact on the US was enormous. It appeared to be losing against an
Figure 9.2
National Security
Council during the
Cuban missile crisis
1111 Figure 9.3 Map to show the Iron Curtain

2111
3
4111 The Iron Curtain
5
6 ICELAND
7 1949
NETHERLANDS
8 CANADA 1949
9 1949 FINLAND
NORWAY
10111 USA 1949
1949
1 SWEDEN
2
DENMARK
3 1949 SOVIET UNION
4 IRISH REPUBLIC
5 GREAT
BRITAIN
6 1949 POLAND
BELGIUM EAST
7 1949
WEST
8 LUXEMBOURG GERMANY
CZEC
HO
SLO
9 1949 FRANCE 1955 VA K I A
1949 I A
20111 AU STR ARY
HUN G
1 SWITZERLAND
ITALY ROMANIA
YU
2 1949 GO
PORTUGAL SL
1949 AV
3 SPAIN
I
BULGARIA
A
4
5 TURKEY
GREECE 1952
6 1952
7
8
9
NATO countries with date of membership Warsaw Pact countries in 1955
30
1
Neutral countries The ‘Iron Curtain’
2
3
4
5
6 enemy it barely respected, an impression sometimes reinforced by the way television reported the war.
7 North Vietnam was certainly receiving aid from China and the USSR, and passing it on to the Viet Cong,
8 but it was Viet Cong tactics that the US struggled to deal with. At home, as US casualties rose, vocal protest
9 against the war intensified. Public opinion as a whole was turning against the war and public demonstra-
40 tions reached dangerous levels during 1969–70. One demonstration in Washington attracted 500,000 people,
1 and at one point the President was trapped in the White House, protected by troops against the angry mob.
2 In 1970 The National Guard’s shooting of four student protesters at Kent State University, Ohio, raised
3 public anger still further.
4 Johnson, devastated by the failures in Vietnam, decided not to seek re-election in 1968. His Vice-
45 President, Humphrey, was narrowly defeated by the Republican candidate Richard Nixon, who promised
46 to look for ways to end the Vietnam War. This was not easy. Just pulling the troops out would immedi-
47 ately lead to North Vietnam conquering the South, and send signals to China and the USSR that the US
48 was too weak to resist communist expansion. North Vietnam refused to negotiate a compromise deal, so
49222 Nixon adopted a policy called ‘Vietnamization’. This would involve a gradual withdrawal of US troops
over a few years. In their place, South Vietnamese troops would be trained and equipped to resist the Viet
Cong. The withdrawal took place but US bombing continued, spreading to Cambodia and Laos, where the
Viet Cong had bases, in 1970. Nixon’s approach generated furious protest in the US but he was re-elected
by a landslide margin in 1972 and, in January 1973, signed the Paris agreements that pulled US troops out
of Vietnam. Congress acted quickly to stop future Presidents from sending troops back in without their
authorisation, and when North Vietnam invaded the South in 1975, refused to intervene. US policy had
resulted in communist control, not just of the whole of Vietnam, but also Cambodia and Laos.
Johnson, rather than Nixon, has attracted most blame for the Vietnam defeat. Nixon became more
notorious for the Watergate scandal. However, Nixon showed some skill and had some success in foreign
policy. A policy of détente towards the USSR bore fruit in a 1969 treaty to stop the proliferation of nuclear
weapons. This was followed by the first SALT (Strategic Arms Limitations Talks) agreement in 1972.
Even more impressively, Nixon started negotiations with China, making his first visit there in February
1972, and leading to more cordial relations thereafter. When Nixon resigned in 1974, his Vice-President,
Gerald Ford, succeeded him. Meetings at Vladivostock and Helsinki followed, marking a thaw in relations
with the USSR. However, Ford’s successor, Jimmy Carter (elected in 1976) had more difficulties with
détente. A second SALT agreement with the USSR was rejected by Congress, and the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan in 1979 led to outrage in the United States. Détente seemed to have been taken too far and
the USSR seemed to be taking advantage of US weakness. Carter tried to take a tougher line but his own
reputation was further damaged by a crisis in Iran, where US citizens were taken hostage. Attempts to
rescue them failed and Carter seemed weak. He lost the 1980 election to Ronald Reagan, a conservative
Republican who was critical of détente and determined to strengthen the US’s world position.
The end of the Cold War, 1980–2001
Reagan immediately showed his foreign policy colours. Defence and CIA budgets were increased rapidly
and attention was paid to more sophisticated and accurate offensive and defensive weapons, including the
cruise missile and the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). This attracted controversy in both Europe and
the US itself, where economic problems and fear of nuclear holocaust made Reagan’s nuclear spending
seem reckless. Reagan’s aggressive rhetoric, referring to the USSR as an ‘evil empire’ at one point, also
attracted criticism. US intervention in Lebanon, Grenada and Nicaragua led to Congress cutting off funding
for Reagan’s foreign policy intrigues. Reagan then authorised the sale of arms to Iran and used the proceeds
to fund illegally the Nicaraguan Contras, a scandal that almost brought him down in 1986. The bombing
of Libya in April 1986, which was an attempt at regime change after a terrorist attack on US servicemen,
reflected the President’s strong approach to foreign affairs.
Alongside this, though, Reagan was trying to initiate talks with the USSR. The President’s genuine
horror at nuclear weapons saw fruitless attempts at agreements with the USSR. A turning point came with
the appointment of Gorbachev as Soviet leader in 1985. He was conscious of the USSR’s economic weak-
ness and sought ways of reducing military spending. Meetings at Geneva in 1985 and Reykjavik in 1986
saw disagreement about the future of SDI but enough understanding was reached to lead to the December
1987 INF Treaty in Washington, a major breakthrough in nuclear arms reduction. The USSR then
announced cuts in conventional forces in Europe and this led on to the collapse of communism in Eastern
Europe as unpopular governments, no longer protected by Soviet military force, were thrown out.
Reagan had served two terms and was not eligible for re-election in 1988. His Vice-President, George
Bush, was elected instead and was more suspicious of the USSR than Reagan had eventually been. This did
not delay negotiations for long and events overtook US foreign policy as communism collapsed, first in
Eastern Europe, then in the USSR itself in 1991. This had a destabilising effect in the former USSR, and
the establishment of a secure relationship was one of the challenges facing US foreign policy after 1991.
Meanwhile the end of the Cold War seemed evident in the two superpowers’ consensus on Iraq’s invasion
ESSAYS • 225
1111 of Kuwait in 1990. The US led a successful UN liberation of Kuwait in 1991 and finished the year as the
2111 world’s only superpower. The Cold War was won, but this was to pose US foreign policy difficult ques-
3 tions in the years to come.
4111 Through the 1990s, US foreign policy was reappraised and, while Congress cut defence spending by
5 25 per cent and talked of a more unilateral approach to foreign policy, the Clinton administration
6 (1993–2001) declared its commitment to active engagement in world affairs. Clinton was instinctively liberal
7 and, in agreement with his Secretaries of State Warren Christopher and Madeline Albright, supported and
8 promoted democracy across the globe. Immediately he ran into problems. The US led UN intervention in
9 Somalia in 1993, which, after abandoning its peacekeeping brief and attempting to arrest one troublesome
10111 clan leader, saw eighteen marines killed and all US troops evacuated by the end of the year. Thereafter the
1 US was reluctant to intervene in Africa and Clinton refused to send troops to Liberia or Rwanda despite
2 the humanitarian atrocities being committed there. Relations between the US and the UN, rarely in total
3 harmony, cooled and by 1996 the US was failing to pay $1.4 billion owed to the UN.
4 More successful were US attempts to reorientate NATO, an organisation that had lost direction since
5 the end of the Cold War. Central and Eastern European states, newly free of communist rule, were encour-
6 aged to apply for NATO membership and thus stabilise Europe, without aggravating Russian hostility.
7 A sign of NATO’s new role was its intervention in the former Yugoslavia, working alongside the UN to
8 enforce peace. The US was also successful, in a period of economic boom, in strengthening its worldwide
9 economic influence. Canada and Mexico were brought together into the North American Free Trade
20111 Association (NAFTA) in 1994, China was encouraged to embrace the global economy and the US success-
1 fully blocked a Japanese initiative to create an Asian Monetary Fund in 1998, which would have undermined
2 the US-dominated IMF.
3 Clinton’s Presidential successor, George W. Bush, initially spoke of a wish to build on Clinton’s inter-
4 nationalism. This was quickly forgotten as a more aggressive and unilateral foreign policy was implemented.
5 The US withdrew from the 1997 Kyoto Treaty, which had sought to reduce world pollution and began, to
6 the consternation of Russia, China and fellow NATO members, to develop a ‘son of Star Wars’ National
7 Missile Defense initiative (NMD). The September 11 atrocity in 2001 shocked the US, but won worldwide
8 sympathy and popularised Bush’s Presidency. However, it was not long before support for Bush’s foreign
9 policy would fade outside the US. The UN Security Council and many NATO members would refuse to
30 support the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, the US was voted off UN panels on drug control and human rights
1 and the long-term future direction of US involvement in world affairs would seem less clear than at any
2 time since the 1930s.
3
4
5 Part 2: Essays
6
7 The origins and beginnings of the Cold War
8
9 1 From Truman’s speech to Congress in March 1947:
40 I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting
1 attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.
2
(a) Explain the Truman Doctrine in relation to US foreign policy. (3)
3
4 (b) What were the causes of the Cold War? (7)
45 (c) To what extent was Truman’s foreign policy a success? (15)
46 (AQA)
47
48 (a) The Truman Doctrine, outlined in 1947, is essentially another term for the policy of ‘containment’.
49222 It pledged the US to ‘support free peoples who are resisting attempted aggression by armed minorities or
outside pressure’ and was initially applied to aid sent to the governments of Greece and Turkey, helping
both countries to fend off threats from communism. The doctrine served as the basis of US foreign policy
for the next thirty years.
(b) The Cold War did not begin suddenly. Relations between the US and the USSR had experienced
strains long before the Second World War, the wartime alliance between the two was based on common
enemies rather than genuine friendship, and a series of events and pronouncements made by both sides
saw a decline in relations between 1945 and 1949. The years 1946 and 1947 are most commonly identified
as the point where ‘Cold War’ became an accurate description of US–Soviet relations. However, historians
have suggested 1945, 1943 and even 1917 as starting points.
As well as disputing when the Cold War began, there is disagreement on why it began. There is a temp-
tation to try to apportion blame, which clouds the truth. Both the US and the USSR saw themselves as the
innocent party reacting in self-defence (and the defence of others) against the aggressive expansionism of
the other superpower. In the 1960s, US foreign policy became subject to widespread public criticism in the
West and this led to accusations that the US had overreacted to Soviet expansion after 1945, thus causing
a Cold War. More recently, historians have argued that a harmonious settlement to the Second World War
in Europe was never likely to occur and Stalin is again considered partly to blame for this.
There seemed to be a fundamental conflict of ideology between the US, the most powerful capitalist
state, and the USSR, the only major communist state in 1945. This difference in ideology framed much of
the rhetoric and propaganda used by each side against the other during the Cold War. This does not mean
it caused the Cold War. However, the US was uncomfortable with the communist USSR from the start.
Although US troops had been sent to Russia in 1918 in an attempt to help depose the new communist
government, the US did not grant diplomatic recognition to the USSR until 1933, and then only in an
attempt to increase its international trade which was suffering from the Great Depression at the time. Not
only was the USSR communist, it was also totalitarian. The US wanted open markets to trade with, and
the USSR’s state control of its economy meant that US consumer goods could not tap into the USSR’s
economic potential. In the 1920s, the USSR had invited some foreign investment and the US responded
to the tune of $60 million. After 1928 the USSR was less inviting to foreign investment – to the US’s dismay.
For the US, by 1945 the memory of the Great Depression was still fresh, and the USSR’s subsequent refusal
to open Eastern Europe to US trade was intolerable. The period 1917–41 was not, for the most part, a ‘Cold
War’ but the difficulties of that period contributed to misunderstandings after 1945.
Because the US and USSR were allies during 1941–5, and the propaganda machines of both states were
praising each other at this time, this can lead to an assumption that the dramatic decline in relations after
the Second World War caused the Cold War. However, the world war made several important contribu-
tions. Both the US and the USSR were forced into the war by sudden, unexpected (and, in retrospect, rather
embarrassing) attacks by Japan and Germany respectively in 1941. The US realised its geographical
position no longer made it secure from attack and was determined not to be caught off guard again; and
the USSR had now been invaded twice in less than thirty years and was determined not to allow a strong,
unfriendly Germany to rise up again. Both the US and the USSR had observed and learned lessons
from the failed policy of appeasement in the 1930s. By 1943, it seemed that the Allies were bound to win
the Second World War, although it would not happen quickly. This turned minds to the state of Europe
after the war. Stalin seems to have realised by 1944 that his main aim should be to occupy and control as
much territory as possible.
The result of the war in Europe was not just the defeat of Germany but the creation of a huge geo-
political and economic vacuum in Central and Eastern Europe. This made the expansion of Soviet influence
possible as well as desirable for the USSR. The US, as a global economic power, wanted a European economic
recovery based upon free trade, which would require US involvement in European affairs after the world
war. In this context, the failure of the US and its allies to open a second front in Western Europe against
Nazi Germany before 1944 meant that an opportunity to keep Central and at least some of Eastern Europe
ESSAYS • 227
1111 from Soviet control had been lost. This, coupled with Roosevelt’s belief that binding decisions were best
2111 left until a United Nations was set up after the world war, meant that the conferences at Tehran (1943),
3 Yalta and Potsdam (1945) failed to reach meaningful agreement on the future of Europe.
4111 What followed after Potsdam was a series of high-profile developments that fuelled a Cold War, which
5 brings the roles of the leaders of the USSR and US under the spotlight. Stalin, the unquestioned dictator
6 of the USSR, baffled and angered the US with his attitude. If Stalin had chosen not to dominate Eastern
7 Europe after the Second World War, the Cold War would probably not have developed. However, Stalin
8 had never trusted the West and felt that Soviet security lay in territorial occupation, not international agree-
9 ments. His Foreign Minister, Molotov, later admitted ‘my task was to expand the borders of the fatherland
10111 as much as possible’, Stalin has been portrayed as a ‘Red Emperor’ with imperialist aims in the tradition
1 of Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great. He has also been portrayed as reckless, paranoid and unstable.
2 However, his foreign policy after 1945 seems to be carefully designed, even cautious at times. He was
3 certainly an opportunist, though, and was not prepared to see the USSR relinquish its opportunity to control
4 over Eastern Europe having sacrificed so much to defeat Germany. To the US this seemed unfathomable
5 so, regardless of Stalin’s true aims, he was perceived as dangerous and untrustworthy.
6 The US’s wartime President, Roosevelt, died in 1945 and was replaced by Truman. As this was soon
7 followed by the Cold War, it is tempting to suggest that Truman himself must have been a factor. The
8 image of Truman is as a no-nonsense, tough-talking President who, as well as authorising the use of
9 the atom bomb against Japan, also spoke fiercely against the USSR (which he certainly did once the Cold
20111 War was under way). He has been criticised for his lack of delegation, hasty decision-making, lack of foreign
1 policy experience and for masking personal insecurity by presenting a tough front. Looking closer, we find
2 evidence of Truman’s antipathy towards the USSR. In 1941 he said ‘if Russia is winning we ought to help
3 Germany and that way let them kill as many as possible’, although he admitted he would ultimately prefer
4 the defeat of Nazi Germany. The day after becoming President in 1945 he declared: ‘We must stand up to
5 the Russians.’ However, these comments were made in private to government insiders, and were not for
6 public consumption. Truman did not reverse Roosevelt’s foreign policy of accommodating the USSR’s
7 wishes for nearly a year. During that time it became apparent that, while Roosevelt’s public reputation
8 after his death was sky-high, his foreign policy had proved to be a mess and could not be sustained. Truman
9 complained in December 1945, ‘I’m tired of babying the Soviets’, and thereafter US rhetoric against
30 the USSR was more aggressive. Truman thus presided over the developing Cold War, and although he
1 arguably missed opportunities for reconciliation with the USSR, more often he had little option but to act
2 the way he did.
3 The events of 1945 onwards collectively cooled US–Soviet relations to a point of ‘Cold War’, and we
4 need to assess whether any particular event had special significance in causing the Cold War. The US’s
5 refusal to share the atom bomb with the USSR was hardly surprising, and both sides knew that the USSR
6 would be able to develop its own within five to ten years, possibly less. The USSR’s refusal to ease its grip
7 on Eastern Europe is more significant and has been pinpointed as the cradle of the Cold War. While the
8 US was initially prepared to accept this in return for promises of democratic elections in the occupied
9 states, by 1947 it was denouncing it fiercely and condemning the USSR’s refusal to allow Marshall Aid into
40 Eastern Europe. The year before, however, the USSR’s refusal to pull its troops out of northern Iran had
1 led to a strong US response and had led to a Soviet withdrawal after several months. This episode was
2 significant as, not only did diplomatic tempers spill over with the Soviet delegation storming out of a UN
3 meeting, but also the US had threatened force and had faced the USSR down. This was to set the tone of
4 US foreign policy in the future.
45 The year 1946 was also a significant year for words. Winston Churchill’s famous ‘Iron Curtain’ speech
46 in March 1946 did not directly cause a change in US foreign policy, but it did anger the USSR, which was
47 more hostile in its own rhetoric thereafter. Also, Kennan’s 8,000-word ‘long telegram’ provided the basis
48 for the US’s future policy of ‘containment’ against communism. Arguably the Cold War was under way
49222 by 1946.
In conclusion, the causes of the Cold War seem to lie in the perceptions both sides had of each other.
Neither the US nor the USSR were primarily driven by ideology, however each believed that the other was,
and developed their response accordingly. This mutual suspicion was present long before the start of the
Second World War. However, the course of the war left both superpowers deeply involved in European
and world affairs, and the effects and results of the war meant that urgent questions were raised for which
no mutually acceptable solution could be found. Both sides could have acted differently at times during
1945–9, but to blame either seems to lose sight of the real causes of the Cold War.
(c) Truman was a potential disaster for American foreign policy. With a new world order emerging, the
new American President in 1945 had no experience of running foreign affairs and said of his appointment:
‘I felt like the moon, the stars, and all of the planets had fallen on me.’ He had been Vice-President for
only a year, he had never been part of Roosevelt’s inner circle, and had been kept in ignorance of devel-
opments as significant as the Manhattan Project. Nonetheless as President he was determined to be, and
was, the man in charge. He has to be judged on his record, not his lack of experience. By 1952 although
he had suffered several foreign policy difficulties, in the longer term he can be seen as a success.
Roosevelt was a tough act to follow, not just because of his record as President but also the problems
he bequeathed to Truman. The wartime Grand Alliance was already in decay and the recent Yalta Conference
had fudged the issue of post-war Europe and the future of Germany in particular. Truman found that
Roosevelt’s foreign policy simply could not be continued; new situations required new thinking. Truman
was also constrained by public opinion which, initially, demanded a removal of commitment to Europe
once the war was over, a Congress under Republican control from 1946 onwards, and economic prob-
lems such as inflation, meat shortages and labour strikes by late 1946. The greatest constraint of all was
the USSR’s seizing of the initiative in Europe as they refused, in effect, to relinquish control of Soviet-
occupied territories. Stalin’s intentions for Europe are still debated, at the time they looked like
expansionism and repression. Truman had to respond to that.
The most infamous early Truman decision was to use the atom bomb against Japan. The moral debate
has raged ever since, but as a short-term military initiative it was a success; Japan surrendered within a
week. Truman’s decision not to share the atom bomb with the USSR upheld a decision made by Roosevelt
in 1944, and gave the US a temporary, but useful, advantage. Truman arguably overplayed this. His instincts
were to take a tough line with the USSR – only his second meeting with Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov
saw previous cordiality vanish and Molotov complain: ‘I have never been talked to like that in my life.’
Truman’s reply was brief and not conciliatory. He was willing to give-and-take, but believed that the US
should be able to get 85 per cent of what it wanted. As a result, the Potsdam Conference did not solve the
problem of Europe. Later in 1945 Truman’s adviser Henry Stimson suggested that more open negotiations
were needed without ‘this weapon rather ostentatiously on our hip’. Truman refused and, to the USSR’s
irritation, continued to boast of the bomb. In reality the US’s atomic bombs were too few and too small
at this stage to be an ultimate sanction against the USSR; Stalin knew this, and in any case had developed
his own atomic bomb by 1949. An opportunity to reach a satisfactory settlement had perhaps been lost
because of Truman’s approach.
Another Truman adviser, Clark Clifford, noted that ‘in times of crisis the American citizen tends to
back up his President’. By late 1946 the crisis seemed to be receding, or at least freezing into stalemate with
no major new developments. The US had fought two world wars in Europe without much thanks, and
Truman could not afford to restore conscription or halt post-war demobilisation – from eight million to
one million men under arms within two years. The year 1947 was a frustrating one, with communism still
a threat in Greece and China, and the USSR tightening its grip over Eastern Europe. Truman played up
the communist threat and persuaded Congress to spend $400 million to protect Greece and Turkey. He was
risking the loss of public support for his plans to ‘contain’ communism. However, his resolute response to
the Berlin blockade in 1948 strengthened anti-communist feeling, and Truman’s popularity, helping to
explain his narrow victory in the 1948 Presidential election. Within a year the European situation had frozen
ESSAYS • 229
1111 into a static, but, as a result, more stable balance, which Truman consolidated by creating NATO in 1949.
2111 The US had avoided defeat in the Cold War in Europe, for which Truman deserves some credit. How-
3 ever, Mao’s communist victory in China in 1949 reflected badly on Truman’s administration, which had
4111 arguably failed to provide sufficient backing for the defeated nationalist government. Furthermore, his anti-
5 communist rhetoric encouraged McCarthyism in 1950, with unpleasant domestic consequences.
6 Truman’s activation of containment policy in Korea in June 1950 also won popular support and was
7 an initial success. Typically, he acted quickly and decisively. North Korea’s attack on the South was inter-
8 preted as USSR opportunism, but the USSR, and China, did not intervene when US troops rapidly cleared
9 the North Korean forces out of the South. It was MacArthur’s idea, not Truman’s, to continue the war by
10111 crossing the 38th parallel and invading the North, but Truman still has to take responsibility. The oppor-
1 tunity to defeat communism in Korea was too tempting. The gamble almost succeeded, as did the later
2 gamble of removing MacArthur from command, but China soon carried out its threat to intervene and
3 US forces were forced back south. It was now difficult for the US to end the war and avoid perceived defeat,
4 and this unhappy stalemate led to Truman’s decision not to seek re-election in 1952.
5 The unfinished Korean War was one legacy left by Truman for his successor, Eisenhower, to deal with.
6 However, there were other more positive legacies. By 1952, the US had given Western Europe security,
7 even rearming West Germany, had made a peace treaty with Japan giving the US useful military bases
8 on the other side of the Pacific, and had also developed a thermonuclear bomb, once again giving the it a
9 lead in nuclear arms. As Ambrose points out, his government’s achievements were breathtaking. The Cold
20111 War was partly caused by Truman’s approach to foreign policy, and he certainly framed the terms in
1 which it would be conducted, costing billions of dollars and tens of thousands of lives. However, if we put
2 his achievements in the context of 1945 problems, and set against the missed opportunities the denial of
3 opportunities to the USSR, his record stands up well.
4
6
7 2 (a) What impact did the Truman Doctrine have upon superpower relations? (10)
8 (b) What other factors led to the formation of NATO in 1949? (20)
9 (Edexcel format without sources)
30
1 Advice: To answer these questions you should include the following points:
2
• Immediate consequence of the Truman Doctrine – intervention in Greece and Turkey;
3
• the USSR felt threatened – increased hostility;
4
• The US introduced policy of ‘containment’ – extended Cold War beyond Europe to Korea, Vietnam, etc.
5
Basis of US foreign policy for decades thereafter;
6
• NATO set up as a consequence of continued Soviet military power and control in Eastern Europe – deter-
7
rent to Soviet westwards expansion;
8
• NATO combined with Marshall Aid to cement good relations between US and Western Europe – US needed
9
European support if it was to pursue containment against the USSR;
40
• NATO was a means of securing West Germany as part of democratic Western Europe.
1
2
3 The development of the Cold War in the 1950s and early 1960s
4
45 3 How successful was US intervention in Korea between 1950 and 1953? (30)
46 (Edexcel)
47
48 By autumn 1950 the US intervention in Korea seemed to have been completely successful, with its orig-
49222 inal aims apparently achieved. South Korea was again free from communist control and the USSR and
China, faced with US determination, had not intervened. Congress had adopted the defence spending plan
proposed by the National Security Council (NSC), and Truman’s credibility seemed to be restored. Yet
three years later Dean Acheson referred to the Korean War as: ‘The greatest disaster which occurred to the
Truman administration. It did more to destroy and undermine American foreign policy than anything I
know about.’ Although this could be seen as an overstatement.
The decision to cross the 38th parallel and invade North Korea led to Chinese intervention on the
side of the North. Mao apparently spent 60 hours pacing up and down before deciding to intervene (and
the USSR apparently would not have intervened even if China had not), so it was a close decision, but
China had publicly and clearly warned beforehand that it would do so. As a result the war became a stale-
mate, dragging on through to 1953 with an estimated 34,000 US combat deaths; not many perhaps when
compared to estimates of 1 million Chinese and 3.5 million Korean deaths, but still too many for what was
meant to be a small, peripheral war for the US. It was hard to end the war, given the refusal of both North
and South to conciliate and the fear that China might overrun South Korea if the US pulled out. Although
by 1953 the original aim to keep South Korea free of communism was achieved, the war was judged as a
draw at best, even a defeat for the US.
The escalation of the war also broadened the Cold War with relations between the US and China
souring, and not improving until the 1970s: a path that was not inevitable before the Korean War.
A.T. Steel’s cynical remark that ‘700 million potential customers had turned into the apparition of 700
million dangerous adversaries’ perhaps overstates the consequences of the Korean War, but it drove China,
at least temporarily, into the USSR’s camp and led to increased US commitment to East Asia. The US now
had to protect Japan, Taiwan and Indo-China, leading eventually to the Vietnam War.
Truman’s domestic position, weak before June 1950 but strengthened by the original success of the
Korean intervention, fell away again. McCarthyism raged at home, not caused, but fuelled by the lack
of victory in Korea. Truman’s decision to dismiss General MacArthur in 1951 was unpopular at home,
causing Truman’s popularity to fall to an estimated 24 per cent and influencing his decision not to stand
for re-election in 1952. Truman’s Democrat party lost control of the Presidency anyway, with Stevenson
defeated by the Republican (and military general), Eisenhower. One of Eisenhower’s election promises was
to ‘go to Korea’.
In the longer term, the US intervention in Korea was seen in a more positive light, mainly because
of what did not happen as a consequence. South Korea was not lost to the communists, and a study by
military historian Stanley Sandler shows that US forces were more effective and better organised in Korea
than was thought at the time. The Korean War tested the boundaries of the Cold War in what was, for
all but the Koreans, a peripheral arena. The war did not spread outside Korea and nuclear weapons,
despite MacArthur’s wishes, were not used, nor is there convincing evidence of the accusation made at
the time that the US was using bacteriological weapons. The US showed restraint, but also showed itself
ready to fight communist expansion. The USSR also showed restraint by avoiding direct involvement and
not trying to apply pressure in Europe while US eyes were elsewhere. Neither side could go into future
conflicts and expect to win easy, complete victories. A useful note of caution entered Cold War diplomacy
as a result.
However, the type of Cold War created by the Korean War had drawbacks. The US was frozen into a
single global vision where communism had to be opposed regardless of the regional circumstances. This
meant an escalating and more permanent commitment to East Asia. This meant a huge defence budget for
decades to come, an apparently unlimited nuclear arms race and a constant, wearing vigilance and anxiety
for the US. The Cold War would not now thaw in a hurry.
ESSAYS • 231
1111
2111 The Cuban missile crisis
3
4111 4 (a) What were the immediate causes of the Cuban missile crisis? (30)
5 (b) Assess the significance of the Cuban missile crisis with regard to world peace. (60)
6 (OCR)
7
8 (a) Lack of understanding lay at the heart of the Cuban missile crisis. Neither Kennedy nor Khrushchev
9 knew just how far the other could be pushed. Both leaders made moves during the crisis without full know-
10111 ledge of what the other side had already done. Neither seemed fully in control, or to understand the stakes
1 with which they were playing.
2 J.F. Kennedy is viewed today as one of the greatest US Presidents. But in autumn 1962, his reputation
3 was not yet secured. The first full year of his foreign policy had been disappointing. A CIA-backed inva-
4 sion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in 1961, authorised by Kennedy against the advice of his Joint Chiefs of
5 Staff, had been a humiliating failure, with all invaders either killed or captured. It took 20 months, and a
6 ransom of $53 million (paid in food and medical supplies) to secure the return of the prisoners. The US
7 saw Castro’s regime as communist, and his seizure of US-owned property in Cuba, coupled with trade
8 negotiations with the USSR, seemed to confirm this. Kennedy did not give up and identified the removal
9 of Castro as the government’s top priority. Trade embargoes were set up, the CIA was eager to try again
20111 and ‘Operation Mongoose’, a plan to destabilise Cuba, included plans to invade Cuba again in late 1962.
1 Castro was well aware of US hostility, and made sure that Khrushchev was also aware of the danger
2 to Cuba. The circumstances at the time made Khrushchev determined to help his new ally. Under pres-
3 sure at home due to failing economic policies, criticised by China for weakness, conscious of a US advantage
4 in nuclear missiles and, above all, aware of US missiles stationed in Turkey in 1961 (but not aware that
5 Kennedy had already ordered their removal), Khrushchev decided to look for a prestigious victory by trans-
6 porting nuclear warheads to Cuba. His advisers were keen, Andropov seeing Cuba as the ‘soft underbelly
7 of the Americans’. Such a move would help to protect Castro. And from what he had seen so far, Khrushchev
8 believed the young US President could be pushed – he had no contingency plan worked out if Kennedy
9 pushed back.
30 Kennedy had come off worse against Khrushchev so far, and it had infuriated him. The Bay of Pigs
1 fiasco had been followed by an unsatisfactory meeting at Vienna, where a bullish Khrushchev had proved
2 unaccommodating. Kennedy had also been powerless to stop the Berlin Wall (although he had kept West
3 Berlin from communist control) and Khrushchev was demanding a solution to the Berlin question by the
4 end of the year. The exchanges descended to crude shows of strength, each side pointedly ‘testing’ nuclear
5 warheads, and Kennedy’s assessment of Khrushchev by the end of 1961 seemed to fit Hollywood better
6 than Washington: ‘If Khrushchev wants to rub my nose in the dirt, it’s all over. That son of a bitch won’t
7 pay attention to words. He has to see you move.’ Dean Rusk suggested that the USSR might be preparing
8 to use Cuba to force the West out of Berlin. It was thought that private words with Khrushchev would be
9 no use – action was needed.
40 When the news came through of missile bases appearing in Cuba, and of suspected nuclear warheads
1 being shipped across the Atlantic, the US responded immediately. Kennedy imposed an 800-mile blockade
2 around Cuba, set up EXCOM (a special committee to plan the US response), and demanded that the USSR
3 pull its military presence out of Cuba. The US navy took matters further, ignoring a Kennedy request to
4 reduce the blockade from 800 miles to 500 miles, and forcing USSR submarines to the surface. Egged on
45 by Castro, the USSR shot down an American U2 spy plane flying over Cuba. EXCOM members proposed
46 an air strike, not knowing that nine short-range nuclear missiles were already installed in Cuba. This brought
47 the US right to the brink of nuclear war. Kennedy’s younger brother, Robert, asked for a day’s delay, and
48 used the time to reassure the Soviet ambassador that US missiles would be withdrawn from Turkey. This
49222 was enough to persuade Khrushchev to withdraw, just in time.
Khrushchev later wrote in horror of his consultation with his military commanders over the Cuban
missile crisis. To a man they urged war, fired by determination to defeat the US, unappreciative of the
consequences of nuclear war. Such ignorance and posturing was present on both sides, and nearly destroyed
the world.
(b) The peaceful outcome of the crisis was a tremendous turning point in the Cold War. Both leaders
claimed victory of course, but both were out of office within two years (one assassinated, one ‘resigned’).
However, the legacy of the crisis lasted longer than either leader.
Kennedy had come through a serious test successfully. His prestige at home was enhanced, and left
him better able to assert his control over foreign affairs. Never again would a Presidential aide be sent
packing from a military operations centre, his leader’s orders rejected by a confident armed force. Nor
would the US air force trespass in Siberia, escorting a stray U2 spy plane, against the express orders of the
President. Kennedy took the Cold War away from military control, and US military action in the face of
the USSR would from now be less aggressive and provocative.
This was the theory. In reality, Kennedy continued to stir trouble abroad, encouraging the CIA in
Cuba, continuing to build up a nuclear weapons stockpile, falling out with French President, de Gaulle,
over NATO issues, and above all increasing the US military presence in South Vietnam. Cold War conflict
did not end, it merely transferred the venue to Southeast Asia and Africa. However, there were signs of a
growing détente with the USSR. US missiles in Turkey were removed promptly (although secretly, to protect
Kennedy’s prestige at the expense of Khrushchev’s), a superpower leader’s ‘hotline’ teletype link was set
up, and a Partial Test Ban Agreement in August 1963 ended US, USSR and British (but not French or
Chinese) nuclear tests in space, the atmosphere and under water. This indirectly paved the way for arms
control agreements in later years.
Khrushchev lost prestige as a result of the crisis. His role has been cast in a more favourable light since
the end of the Cold War, but this was not seen at the time. He attempted to use the crisis as a springboard
for détente, and readily acquiesced in the agreements referred to above. However, other Soviet leaders
viewed the US as dangerously confident and demanded that the USSR be militarily strengthened. Khrushchev
was forced to resign as leader in October 1964. His perceived defeat over Cuba was only one of several
reasons for this, but it was certainly a contributory factor. Thereafter the USSR raised its military spending,
but continued to pursue détente with the US. This was mainly due to growing fears of China, which had
developed its own atom bomb and was making aggressive noises against both the USSR and US.
By the mid-1960s the US was also fearful of China, and the legacy of the Cuban missile crisis
compounded this. While more cautious about nuclear brinkmanship, the US felt more confident about its
use of conventional military power, and believed that problems could be resolved without escalating out
of control. All of these factors did not add up to an explanation of the US’s military intervention in Vietnam
– however they made it more likely. The Cuban missile crisis made future nuclear war less likely, but it
did not prevent future war.
PRACTICE QUESTION
5 (a) What were the aims of Kennedy’s foreign policy? (30)
(b) How successful was Kennedy’s foreign policy? (60)

(OCR)
Advice: To answer these questions you should include the following points:
• Kennedy was critical of Eisenhower’s inflexibility and called for a ‘flexible response’ to Cold War problems,
e.g. he developed the ‘Green Berets’ for work in the Third World.
• Strongly anti-appeasement and determined not to give ground to the USSR.
ESSAYS • 233
1111 • Series of failures in 1961 – Bay of Pigs, Vienna meeting with Khrushchev, Berlin Wall.
2111 • Cuban missile crisis seen as a success for Kennedy but closer investigation shows it to have been a near
3 disaster.
4111 • Success in 1963, e.g. Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, record cut short by assassination.
5 • Increased US involvement in Vietnam. Plans to reverse this cut short by assassination, therefore played a
6 part in causing Vietnam War.
7
8
9 The Cold War in Vietnam and Southeast Asia
10111
1 6 Why did Presidents escalate US involvement in Vietnam from the 1950s onwards? (30)
2 (Edexcel)
3
4 Vietnam was the US’s worst nightmare during the Cold War. It found itself increasingly committed to a
5 war it was unlikely to win. The experience of Korea during 1950–3 might have deterred the US from
6 committing itself to Vietnam, and at almost every stage escalation was not the only option in Vietnam.
7 However, a series of carefully considered decisions saw over half a million US troops in Vietnam, and
8 unprecedented use of bombing, by the late 1960s. A lack of understanding of Vietnam’s individual circum-
9 stances lay at the root of US decision-making.
20111 During the Second World War, Vietnam (then called Indo-China) was invaded by Japan, and resis-
1 tance against the invader was led by Ho Chi Minh. Ho was a nationalist as much as a communist. After
2 the war, the former colonial ruler of Indo-China, France, returned and tried to reassert its control. Ho
3 however kept control of North Vietnam and France was close to losing control of South Vietnam by 1954.
4 A French withdrawal would lead to Ho’s forces taking over the South.
5 The US found itself committing money and advisers to propping up South Vietnam after the French
6 withdrawal in 1954 – just one plank of the its ‘containment’ policy. The US had already been meeting two-
7 thirds of the cost of the French occupation of South Vietnam before 1954. As with Korea, it was felt a line
8 had to be drawn against communist expansion to avoid a domino effect in Southeast Asia. John F. Kennedy
9 referred to South Vietnam in 1956 as ‘the finger in the dike’. Japan’s economic recovery would be under-
30 mined if Southeast Asia turned communist. To this end, the US initiated the formation of SEATO and
1 installed Ngo Dinh Diem, who had been in exile in the US, as head of the South Vietnam government.
2 Diem would be bolstered by US economic and military aid, but direct involvement by US troops or bombers
3 was not envisaged at this stage. The US did not foresee what might happen.
4 Although Johnson is the President most associated with escalation of US involvement in Vietnam,
5 Kennedy’s Presidency saw significant change. This was partly caused by instability in Southeast Asia. Diem,
6 a member of the colonial elite, French-speaking and Catholic, was repressive and increasingly unpopular
7 in the predominantly peasant, Buddhist South Vietnam. In 1959 North Vietnam began to infiltrate the
8 South by sending in communist agents who in turn recruited and organised South Vietnamese commu-
9 nists into a guerrilla army, called the ‘National Liberation Front’ or ‘Viet Cong’. By 1960, neighbouring
40 Laos was in danger of falling to communist control, the Viet Cong had begun to fight in South Vietnam,
1 and the newly elected President Kennedy was strongly anti-appeasement – making greater US intervention
2 likely. It was an opportunity to demonstrate his doctrine of ‘flexible response’, and try out his elite ‘Green
3 Berets’, a counter-insurgency force set up to stamp out communist insurrection in the Third World.
4 The temptation to intervene directly in Vietnam was increased by Kennedy’s foreign policy record
45 during 1961. Disappointments in Cuba, Laos and Berlin left Kennedy in need of a victory somewhere.
46 South Vietnam could not be lost. A Presidential task force was sent to investigate the problems in the South,
47 and they returned to recommend more support for Diem. As a result, during 1961–3 the number of US
48 military ‘advisers’ in South Vietnam rose from 400 to 16,000. Still the US involvement in Vietnam seemed
49222 under control. However, in November 1963 Diem was thrown out of power and assassinated. The new
government was weak and unable to control the Viet Cong. Kennedy himself was assassinated a few weeks
later, just when US policy towards Vietnam was in turmoil. The new President was quick to declare ‘Lyndon
Johnson is not going down as the President who lost Vietnam’. This statement reflected not only the sense
of Vietnam’s strategic importance in the context of the Cold War, but also the fear of defeat in the 1964
election – public opinion at this stage still supported containment. Johnson’s opponent in the election was
to be Barry Goldwater, a conservative Republican who was already criticising Johnson over Vietnam.
Johnson was therefore under pressure to act quickly.
The determination to avoid defeat in Vietnam goes some way towards explaining Johnson’s escalation
of US involvement from 1964 onwards. It does not, however, explain why this escalation was so great and
so rapid. In August 1964, supposed attacks by North Vietnamese torpedo boats on US destroyers in the
Gulf of Tonkin (a single bullet hole was the only tangible evidence) led to Congress passing a resolution
giving Johnson a free hand to send US military forces to Vietnam. This resolution, in force until 1970,
meant that Johnson could, crucially, escalate US involvement as quickly as he wanted without having to
persuade Congress. A North Vietnamese attack on a US army barracks at Pleiku in March 1965 provided
a further motive to escalate involvement. US bombers attacked North Vietnam bases, supplies and terri-
tory. US troop numbers in South Vietnam increased from 50,000 in early 1965 to 535,000 by 1968. Why
did Johnson make such a massive commitment?
One answer to this question is overconfidence. Johnson, in a typically brash and forthright statement,
called North Vietnam a ‘raggedy-ass little fourth rate country’. The US air force claimed it could defeat Ho
within a month, and Johnson accepted this simplistic view, believing ‘America wins the wars that she under-
takes’. The enemy was consistently underestimated. All the time it was argued that just a few more troops,
helicopters and bombing campaigns would tip the balance. In 1966, McNamara said that victory was ‘just
around the corner’. Only with the 1968 Tet Offensive did the US lose its confidence. Johnson clearly
misjudged the situation before 1968, but so did public opinion. Arguably, the whole direction and illusion
of the US’s foreign policy led to this moment. The US viewed the conflict in purely Cold War terms and
failed to recognise the specific situation in Vietnam. And overconfidence did not just come from Johnson:
even long after the event, Ronald Reagan claimed that the US would have won in Vietnam, if they had just
committed greater military force . . .
Johnson’s successor, Nixon, recognised that the US was unlikely to win in Vietnam. However, outright
withdrawal was not desirable, yet. Nixon’s solution was to ‘Vietnamise’ the conflict, building up South
Vietnamese forces and gradually withdrawing US forces. However, he escalated US bombing, extending it
into Cambodia and Laos to try to clear out the communists. This reflected the growing strength of the Viet
Cong, the inadequacies of the South Vietnamese army (on one occasion they were helicoptered in to attack
a communist camp and had to be helicoptered out again in humiliating retreat within minutes), and
Nixon’s desperation to negotiate a respectable settlement in the face of North Vietnam’s stubborn refusal
to reach a compromise. A united, communist, but neutral Vietnam might have been achieved years earlier,
but Nixon, like Johnson, Kennedy and Eisenhower before him, could not see beyond the Cold War view
of communism as monolithic and the need for containment. This view led to escalation, a lengthy and
traumatic conflict, and ultimately defeat.
Public opinion and the Vietnam War
7 (a) Assess the nature and extent of public opinion regarding the Vietnam War. (30)
(b) To what extent was public opinion the main reason for US failure in Vietnam? (60)
(OCR)
(a) In November 1969 President Nixon made a televised speech where he referred to the ‘great silent
majority’. While a vocal minority were protesting, the majority of American people did not support their
ESSAYS • 235
1111 protests and were instead supportive of Nixon’s Vietnam policy. One of the best-known aspects of the
2111 Vietnam War is the storm of public protest, especially among students, during the late 1960s and early
3 1970s. This certainly affected US foreign policy. However, the majority voice was not really silent. During
4111 the 1960s and early 1970s, US public opinion was regularly and thoroughly researched through opinion
5 polls. Both Johnson and Nixon kept a close eye on these.
6 Ever since the late 1940s, public opinion had been supportive of the US’s Cold War policy of con-
7 tainment. If a President lost popularity on this issue, it was usually because they were seen as too weak,
8 rather than too strong. Public opinion did eventually turn against the Vietnam War, but not straight away.
9 A poll in May 1964 suggested that only 37 per cent of people were following developments in Vietnam,
10111 the rest showed no real interest in what was happening there – this partly reflected Johnson’s low-key,
1 secretive approach to the build-up of US involvement. By February 1965, shortly before US ground
2 troops were sent to Vietnam, 40 per cent wanted to maintain existing policy, a further 13 per cent wanted
3 greater commitment, 23 per cent wanted peace negotiations and 24 per cent were not sure. This showed
4 a strong majority of those with an opinion supporting US involvement in Vietnam. The 24 per cent
5 ‘not sure’ figure fell to 4 per cent in April 1965, when ground troops had been sent in, while peace nego-
6 tiations now attracted 31 per cent support. This does not suggest a huge adverse reaction to Johnson’s
7 decision to send in the troops.
8 Vocal protest began in earnest in 1965. Colleges and universities held ‘teach-ins’ as a protest against
9 the war. A demonstration in Washington DC in April attracted 15,000 protesters, followed by a series of
20111 ‘Vietnam Summer’ protests and, in October, a march on the Pentagon. Despite this public opinion seemed
1 to rally around Johnson. When asked if the Vietnam war was a mistake, during 1966 only 30–40 per cent
2 said ‘yes’. Johnson’s Presidential approval rating stayed over 50 per cent until June 1967. This suggests that
3 the vocal protests gave a misleading impression of public opinion at first, but gradually public opinion did
4 turn. Johnson warned his aides in October 1967 ‘we’ve got to do something about public opinion’.
5 The Tet Offensive in March 1968 accelerated the growth of public opposition to the war, with public
6 opinion clearly influenced by their perceptions of what had gone on. Although Tet was a military failure
7 for the Viet Cong, the public’s impression was that they were confident and undefeated. Meanwhile, images
8 of shot suspects and burning villages (one US army lieutenant said ‘We had to destroy the town to save
9 it’) appeared on television screens. Johnson’s approval rating plummeted to 35 per cent and, after almost
30 losing the New Hampshire Primary, he declared he would not seek re-election and that he would try to
1 negotiate peace in Vietnam. In 1967, 52 per cent of those polled saw themselves as ‘hawks’ (supporters of
2 military action in Vietnam), while only 35 per cent were ‘doves’. By 1969 only 31 per cent were hawks
3 and 55 per cent were doves.
4 Nixon’s promises to find an honourable end to the war, and the gradual removal of US troops from
5 Vietnam, gave him a higher approval rating than Johnson had finished with, but anti-war protests continued
6 and, if anything, intensified, Nixon admitting in 1969 ‘we are torn by division’, and in November 1969 an
7 estimated 500,000 people demonstrated in Washington. When Nixon sent troops into Cambodia in April
8 1970, university students then went on strike, with four students killed at Kent State University, Ohio, by
9 the National Guard. The extent of vocal protest can be partly explained by the fashion of the times – 1960s
40 US youths were protesting before Vietnam and civil rights became high-profile issues – but, set against this,
1 another fashion of the times was to loyally support the President in fighting the Cold War. The level of
2 protest reached at the end of the 1960s was unprecedented in Cold War US. Nixon retained enough support
3 to win a second term in 1972, but his decision to bomb Hanoi in December 1972 saw his approval rating
4 slump to 43 per cent.
45 Vocal protest raised public awareness of Vietnam: over 500,000 American young men sent into an
46 atrocious and destructive war which the US did not seem to be winning, eventually turned public opinion
47 against its Presidents. When George Bush announced on television that US troops were fighting Iraq in
48 1991, one of the first things he said was ‘this will not be another Vietnam’. This was addressed to ‘the silent
49222 majority’.
(b) Public opinion did not cause US failure in Vietnam, although it did put constraints upon Johnson’s
and Nixon’s attempts to end the war successfully. However there were greater constraints working upon
them.
Johnson did not prepare public opinion for a major war in Vietnam. Expecting an easy victory, the
escalation of forces was not loudly publicised. Even once the scale of the war was clear to all, public opinion
did not worry Johnson until late 1967. It was not so much the initial act of war in Vietnam that upset
public opinion, but the way the war went on without success for years. As Nixon said, ‘Public opinion will
not continue to support a war that drags on without tangible signs of progress.’ When public hostility
became intolerable after the Tet Offensive, Johnson did not pull US troops out of Vietnam. Instead,
he decided not to seek re-election that year. His successor, Nixon, knew that he would not be forced to
end the war immediately. However, he also knew that public opinion would not tolerate any substantial
escalation of US forces in Vietnam. As the existing level of forces was not enough to win the war, he would
have to look for a way to end the war ‘with honour’, and try to appease public opinion by reducing the
number of US troops in Vietnam. A plan, code-named ‘Duck Hook’ – to force North Vietnam to make
peace by threatening massive retaliation if they did not – was quietly shelved after a spate of anti-war
demonstrations in autumn 1969. Although public opinion would not now let the US win the war, the US
had failed to win the war before public opinion became a constraint.
Vietnam was not a suitable country in which to fight a war of containment. Left to its own devices
after the Second World War, the whole of Vietnam would have turned communist. The North was not
just the core of Vietnamese communism, it was also the core of Vietnamese nationalism. South Vietnam
had no such sense of purpose, its only purpose being negative – to keep out communism. The South
Vietnamese, mostly Buddhist peasants, never had a really popular regime to support. Ngo Dinh Diem, a
French-speaking Catholic, who had been in exile in the US and who was closer to the old colonial elite
than the population at large, had replaced the earlier French colonial rule. Diem did not ever offer the
strong, nationalist leadership presented by Ho Chi Minh. Diem also refused to hold democratic elections.
By the early 1960s Buddhist monks were making suicide protests against Diem’s regime, and when he was
overthrown, a strong, popular government was never found to replace him. The US was disappointed by,
but should not have been surprised at, the reluctant and lacklustre attitude of South Vietnamese soldiers
and civilians when caught up in military conflict. Who were they fighting for? If the war was to be won,
it would have to be won by US force.
The US expected a quick and easy victory. Although Johnson sent large numbers of troops to Vietnam,
they were only deployed piecemeal, reflecting US confidence. The French had been driven out of Vietnam,
but the US had a higher opinion of themselves militarily than of the French. Despite the fact that Viet
Cong forces would have to be rooted out before an attack on the North could successfully be carried out,
the army was prepared to fight a conventional war – this was inappropriate. The Viet Cong fought using
guerrilla tactics, and were usually able to dictate when and where they would engage the enemy. The Tet
Offensive is a good example of this even though it failed; it also caused support for the war in the US to
fall away further. The US commander, General William Westmoreland, adopted a policy of attrition: to
‘search and destroy’ communist enclaves – but this proved to be like chasing the wind. North Vietnam
received ample aid from the USSR and other communist states, including anti-aircraft weapons and some
fighters and light bombers. Despite this, the US enjoyed air dominance, and had some successes, such as
the 1968 Khe Sang campaign. However, air power was overrated, overused and limited by the thick jungle
covering much of the country. Attempts at defoliation were ineffective; attempts to attack Viet Cong supply
lines failed miserably; and as the US pushed more and more troops into the conflict during 1965–8,
North Vietnam used the secret ‘Ho Chi Minh Trail’ to pour soldiers and supplies into the South, matching
US increases.
If a military victory was beyond US abilities, could a political victory be achieved by negotiation? North
Vietnam was stubborn, despite encouragement by the USSR to make peace. It demanded control of South
ESSAYS • 237
1111 Vietnam and the unconditional removal of US troops, which was not acceptable to the US. Johnson spoke
2111 of negotiation but never took it seriously, a military victory seeming preferable. Johnson’s lack of political
3 understanding of Vietnam made him over-optimistic that the North would have to give in. He also over-
4111 estimated the South’s support for US involvement with his policy of ‘nation building’ doing nothing to
5 win South Vietnamese hearts and minds. Johnson’s views were, however, shared by many Americans. There
6 was, in senator Fulbright’s words (1966), an ‘arrogance of power’ evident in the US’s political approach.
7 Eventually, in 1973, a peace deal was negotiated and US troops finally left Vietnam. Less than two
8 years later, North Vietnam broke the treaty (South Vietnam had technically breached the treaty already,
9 but not to the same extent) and overran the South. This confirmed US intervention in Vietnam as a failure.
10111 Since the end of the war, there have been attempts to re-evaluate the causes of defeat. Reagan blamed
1 timidity in US politics for the defeat. Kissinger claimed that Congress, by passing the War Powers Act in
2 1973, undermined the President’s power to act if North Vietnam broke the agreement, so that when the
3 North invaded the South, President Ford was not in a position to prevent it. Nixon had apparently promised
4 aid to South Vietnam if the treaty was broken, but he was now out of office as a result of the Watergate
5 scandal. Kissinger suggested that, had Nixon still been in office, North Vietnam would not have dared to
6 break the treaty. This seems an optimistic suggestion!
7 Ultimately, the vocal expression of hostile public opinion was a feature, but certainly not a cause, of
8 the US’s slide to defeat in Vietnam. It was a war that, with hindsight, the US did not need to fight and
9 would probably not have fought if it could have foreseen the consequences. There was plenty of govern-
20111 ment discussion of the consequences of not fighting, but a lack of understanding of the actual situation in
1
Vietnam. Additionally, we should acknowledge that, regardless of by what means and even with substan-
2
tial Soviet backing, North Vietnam won a dramatic victory apparently against all odds. The war had always
3
appeared to be one that the US should be able to win, but, because of North Vietnamese tactics and
4
resilience, in reality it was not.
5
6
8
8 (a) Assess the impact of the Tet Offensive on the Vietnam War. (30)
9
30 (b) Why did Nixon find it so hard to end the Vietnam War? (60)
1 (OCR)
2
3 Advice: To answer these questions you need to include the following points:
4
5 • The Tet Offensive was a military failure but psychological success for the Viet Cong.
6 • US public opinion was already becoming dubious about the Vietnam War but the Tet Offensive was a
7 turning point; there were strong public protests and disillusionment thereafter.
8 • Johnson (already heavily criticised) was put under so much pressure he decided not to run as President
9 again. Nixon decided Vietnam War could not be won.
40 • Nixon felt it impossible to just pull out of Vietnam – could cause a ‘domino effect’ in Southeast Asia and
1 encourage USSR and China to spread communism elsewhere.
2 • Nixon weakened by public opposition to the Vietnam War at home – could not strengthen the US
3 negotiating position against North Vietnam.
4 • North Vietnam believed US would not fight indefinitely and refused to compromise – made negotiations
45 difficult.
46
47
48
49222
The end and legacy of the Cold War
9 (a) How important was Ronald Reagan in ending the Cold War? (10)
(b) Why and to what extent was the policy of détente unsuccessful in the 1970s? (20)
(Edexcel format without Sources)
(a) The Cold War could only end either with the collapse of one of the US or USSR, or because both sides
wanted to end it. Of the two leaders in the mid-1980s, Gorbachev seemed the more enlightened and willing
to make concessions. However, this was partly a reflection of desperate economic problems in the USSR.
While Reagan had run up a massive national debt, there was no such desperation on the US’s side to end
hostilities. Nonetheless he negotiated successfully with Gorbachev. As a result of this, Reagan has been given
credit for building up US military strength until the USSR could not compete, and then negotiating from
this position of strength a solution acceptable to both sides.
Reagan was elected on his record as a conservative Republican, calling for a tougher line in the Cold
War and criticising Carter’s weakness in foreign policy. He claimed that the USSR had forged ahead in the
arms race since 1973 as the US cut defence spending. In the light of the USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan
in 1979, this seemed a valid approach. The 1981 defence budget was set at $184 billion, compared to $134
billion in the previous year. Reagan declared that $1.6 trillion would be spent on defence over the next five
years. In fact he never spent more than 6.5 per cent of US GNP on defence, compared to Eisenhower’s
average 10.4 per cent during 1954–9, and the Kennedy/Johnson average of 9.3 per cent during 1960–4.
Carter had planned, if elected, a substantial increase in defence spending for the early 1980s. Reagan’s
defence plans were not so extreme in this context, but the increase in spending, combined with Reagan’s
Cold War rhetoric (he called the USSR an ‘evil empire’ in 1983), US interference in Central American
politics and a revival of anti-nuclear protest in Europe and the US, hardly suggested a President looking
to end the Cold War.
Reagan was always interested in negotiation, however, and he had written to Brezhnev in 1981,
Andropov in 1983 and Chernenko in 1984. In January 1984 he made a public call for reduced nuclear
arsenals and a better understanding with the USSR. The three Soviet leaders, noting the huge US military
build-up, were unimpressed with Reagan’s proposals to reduce nuclear stockpiles. There was no sign of the
USSR becoming conciliatory in the face of US strength. Gorbachev showed much more interest, but was
this could have been due to US strength, the collapsing USSR economy, or Gorbachev’s own belief that
the Cold War was out of date?
Reagan and Gorbachev met four times between 1985 and 1988. A key member of Reagan’s staff
was the Secretary of State George Shultz, a skilled negotiator and diplomat. However, Reagan, using his
tough reputation as a credibility base, took the lead in negotiations, dealing directly with Gorbachev, even
‘off the cuff’. The Reykjavik summit in 1986 was a failure as the two sides failed to agree on the future of
the US SDI initiative, but it set a precedent for open and creative talks. This led on to the INF Treaty
in December 1987, which seemed to formally thaw the Cold War with concrete plans to reduce armaments.
The thawing process continued with exchange visits to Moscow and New York in 1988. Although no US
President had dealt with such a helpful Soviet leader as Gorbachev before, Reagan deserves credit for seeing
the opportunity, understanding the weakness of the USSR’s position and encouraging negotiations. In 1990,
though, the US magazine Time named Mikhael Gorbachev, not Ronald Reagan, as their ‘Man of the Decade’.
(b) ‘Détente’ was the name given to a supposed policy of greater understanding and more direct, peaceful
negotiation to settle quarrels between the US and USSR. In theory it had operated since 1963, on the basis
that there had been no stand-off to the extent of the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, and that there had been a
few agreements regulating nuclear testing and the arms race. This did not, however, provide a strong base
ESSAYS • 239
1111 on which détente could build in the 1970s. The US, who were the main initiators of détente, saw it as an
2111 alternative to military force as a way of containing the USSR; surely the Soviets would see the value of
3 settling quarrels peacefully? The USSR, for their part, saw détente as a sign that the US was no longer able
4111 to maintain military superiority: its willingness to seek peaceful negotiation was a recognition that the USSR
5 was now an equal power and deserved more respectful treatment. Détente was never a state of true cordiality
6 and was largely seen as an opportunity for the USSR to strengthen its world position while the US was
7 relatively weak. A lack of consensus and mutual understanding about the purpose of détente lay at the
8 centre of its failure.
9 Détente operated in three main theatres: Europe, the Third World and the superpower arms race.
10111 Détente was most successful over the issue of Europe, significantly because the USSR was looking for recog-
1 nition of its existing level of control there, rather than an extension of its control. The Germany and Berlin
2 questions were settled at their status quo in 1970 and 1972 respectively. The 1973 Helsinki Conference
3 (which led to the 1975 Helsinki Agreements) saw the West recognise the existing governments in Eastern
4 Europe. In return, the USSR agreed to uphold human rights in its areas of influence – a vague promise
5 which was never enforced properly by the West – and to work more openly with the US to defuse inter-
6 national crises. In theory this was a success for détente, although it only confirmed an existing situation
7 rather than resolved it.
8 The Soviet promise to work more openly with the US was quickly thrown into doubt over the 1973
9 Yom Kippur War. As Soviet military advisers were pulled out of Egypt a month before that country’s
20111 attack on Israel, this left the US suspicious that the USSR had known about, and chosen to keep secret
1
the planned surprise attack by its ally (Egypt) on the US’s ally (Israel). This reflected a continuing
2
Soviet interest in expanding its influence in the Third World. The USSR also successfully intervened in
3
Angola in 1976, Ethiopia in 1977 and Yemen in 1979, prior to its most significant expansionist move of
4
the 1970s, the 1979 invasion of Afghanistan. This was perhaps a response to individual opportunities that
5
arose, rather than a grand plan for Third World supremacy, but it infuriated the US and undermined hopes
6
for détente.
7
The most high-profile achievements of détente were the two SALT agreements. They certainly set a
8
useful precedent: that nuclear arms control could be agreed through top-level talks. SALT I in 1972 limited
9
ABM installations to two sites per superpower. As ABMs were used to destroy incoming missiles, this
30
1 limitation in theory preserved ‘mutually assured destruction’ as a valid deterrent against nuclear attack.
2 There were also limits placed on ICBMs and SLBMs; however the most significant new advances in
3 nuclear weapons technology, especially MIRVs, were left out of SALT I. With long-range bombers also left
4 out, SALT I soon became irrelevant, only restricting forms of nuclear weapons which would eventually
5 become obsolete in the face of new technology. SALT II tried to limit bombers and MIRVs; however, this
6 1979 agreement was rejected by the US Senate after an untimely revelation that a Soviet combat
7 brigade was secretly operating in Cuba (it had in fact been there since 1962) inflamed US political opinion.
8 This showed the difficulties behind achieving really substantial arms control in the context of mutual
9 suspicion.
40 While the USSR was always dubious about good superpower relations, in the US there was a lack of
1 really committed pursuit of détente by successive Presidents. Nixon’s foreign policy priorities were the
2 conclusion of the war in Vietnam and also better relations with China; both were achieved and the latter
3 was a success in its own right. However, the USSR was displeased and threatened by news of US/Chinese
4 détente, and US hopes of ‘linkage’ – combining positive encouragement coupled with threatening pres-
45 sure to persuade the USSR to negotiate – proved a failure from the start. Ford’s Presidency (1974–6) seemed
46 to hold more promise for détente. The 1974 Vladivostok Agreement set guidelines for SALT II negotia-
47 tions, and the Helsinki Agreements were signed in 1975. However, communist advances in Vietnam,
48 Laos, Cambodia and Angola made 1975 a bad year for US foreign policy. This ran alongside economic
49222 decline in the US; GNP fell, inflation rose to 11 per cent and unemployment to 9 per cent. The result was
political division within the US with Ford coming under attack from conservative Republicans, including
Ronald Reagan. Under pressure, Ford banned the word ‘détente’ in US foreign policy and demoted its chief
supporter, Henry Kissinger. The year 1976 was an election year, and by early 1977 the USSR was dealing
with the US’s third President within four years. This lack of continuity undermined détente in a similar
manner to the succession of Soviet leaders in the early to mid-1980s.
The third US President of the 1970s, Carter, has received the harshest criticism of the three for his
foreign policy. Even those historians who lean to the left struggle to judge his policy more highly than
‘incoherent’ or ‘waffle’. Détente was already struggling by 1977, and would probably have failed regard-
less of Carter. However, his lack of experience and leadership in foreign policy managed to irritate but
not intimidate the USSR. His advisers, Secretary of State Vance and National Security Adviser Brzezinski,
were for and against détente respectively. Carter’s idealistic attachment to human rights did not fit well
with the realities of superpower politics, leading to USSR anger at the President’s campaign in support of
Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov. Carter also disregarded the Vladivostok Agreement and unsuccessfully
tried to restart SALT II talks on a new basis. Vance then breached confidentiality and gave the press details
of the US proposals. At the same time, Carter’s low profile over the Ethiopia question in 1977 gave an
impression of US weakness, while a more experienced politician might have successfully pushed SALT II
through Congress in 1979. Even before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the same year, Carter was
abandoning détente and pursuing a tougher line, which was continued and intensified by Reagan in the
early 1980s.
In conclusion, détente was always unlikely to succeed, and US problems with Vietnam, the economy
and uncertain leadership accelerated and increased the extent of its failure. By 1980 the nuclear arms race
had continued its momentum and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan made superpower relations as bad
as they had been at any time since the early 1960s. The improvement in superpower relations in the 1980s
came on a totally different basis to the attempts at détente in the 1970s. Détente was a failure.
PRACTICE QUESTIONS
10 (a) Explain the causes of the 1991 Gulf War. (10)
(b) What impact did the end of the Cold War have upon US foreign policy to 1991? (20)
(Edexcel format without Sources)
Advice: To answer this question you should include the following points:
• Iraq invasion of Kuwait was blatant aggression but previous invasion of Iran had not led to a similar US-
led response.
• Economic factors – Kuwait was oil-rich. Saudi Arabia and UAE were also oil-rich and vulnerable to Iraqi
attack.
• Opportunity for US to work with USSR within the UN and help cement end of the Cold War.
• Bush keen to ‘kick the Vietnam syndrome’ and demonstrate US resolve.
• End of the Cold War left US dominant as main world superpower.
• Role of NATO thrown into question – US keen to keep going in case of new Russian threat.
• Spotlight thrown onto non-superpower dangers, e.g. Middle East.
SOURCES • 241
1111
Part 3: Sources
2111
3
4111 1 The causes of the Cold War
5
6 ■ Source A: Telegram sent from George Kennan, chargé d’affaires at the US Embassy in
7 Moscow, to the US State Department in February 1946
8
9 We have here a political force committed fanatically to the belief that with the US there can be no perma-
10111 nent modus vivendi [acceptance of each others’ way of life], that it is desirable and necessary that the
1 internal harmony of our society be disrupted, our traditional way of life be destroyed, the international
2 authority of our state be broken, if Soviet power is to be secure. . . . We must see that our public is educated
3 to the realities of Russian situation . . . World communism is like malignant parasite which feeds only on
4 diseased tissue.
5
6 ■ Source B: Telegram sent from Nikolai Novikov, Soviet Ambassador to Washington, to
7 Molotov in September 1946
8
9 There has been a decline in the influence on foreign policy of those who follow Roosevelt’s course for co-
20111 operation among peace-loving countries. . . . Obvious indications of the US effort to establish world
1 dominance are also to be found in the increase in military potential in peacetime . . . The present policy
2 of the American government with regard to the USSR is also directed at limiting or dislodging the influ-
3 ence of the Soviet Union from neighbouring countries. In implementing this policy in former enemy or
4 Allied countries adjacent to the USSR, the United States attempts, at various international conferences or
5 directly in these countries themselves, to support reactionary forces with the purpose of creating obstacles
6 to the process of democratisation of these countries. In so doing, it also attempts to secure positions for
7 the penetration of American capital into their economies.
8
9 ■ Source C: James B. Reston writing in Harper’s Magazine, August 1947
30
1 Negotiating with the Russians is like playing tennis on a court without lines or umpire. If the indefatigable
2 Mr Molotov hits one into the net (as he often does) and cries ‘good,’ there is nothing you can do about it
3 except argue. If you call in the French, the British and the Chinese, and they all say, sorry, it went into the
4 net, Mr Molotov is not only adamant but angry. . . . If he is in a bad mood, or if the Politburo feels that
5 they need the point badly, Mr Molotov will veto the others; if not, Mr Molotov will ‘compromise’; he will
6 agree to play the point over. . . . It complicates the process. The European Advisory Commission, which
7 was established long before the end of the war to co-ordinate the post-war policies of the Big Three, met
8 over 500 times and accomplished virtually nothing. . . . We and the Russians start with different objectives
9 and mentalities, are suspicious of the objectives of each other, and adopt totally different methods of nego-
40 tiation.
1
2 ■ Source D: Letter sent from Henry A. Wallace, former Vice-President, to President Truman,
3 July 1946
4
45 I have been increasingly concerned about the trend of international affairs since the end of the war,
46 and I am even more troubled by the apparently growing feeling among the American people that another
47 war is coming and the only way that we can head it off is to arm ourselves to the teeth. . . . We should
48 make an effort to counteract the irrational fear of Russia which is being systematically built up in the
49222 American people by certain individuals and publications. . . . We should not act as if we too felt that we
were threatened in today’s world. We are by far the most powerful nation in the world, the only allied nation
which came out of the war without devastation and much stronger than before the war. Any talk on our
part about the need for strengthening our defences further is bound to appear hypocritical to other nations.
■ Source E: Clark Clifford, former Special Counsel to President Truman, explaining in a 1996
interview why Truman launched the Marshall Plan in 1948
Part of the president’s attitude toward the Soviet Union was we must begin not only to strengthen ourselves,
but to strengthen our historic allies. . . . Now at the end of the Second World War the Soviets were very
powerful militarily; they’d come through the war well. . . . We used to talk about the fact that the Soviets
could, if they chose, send their army westward across Europe and they could march unimpeded to the
British Channel. Nobody could stop them. France was bled dry, Italy was out of the picture, nobody there
to do it. And he thought that it wasn’t enough just for us to strengthen our defences, but that we should
begin to tell the rest of the world what this danger was, and help build them up so that they could be a
force to align themselves with us and defend the world.
The questions and answers that follow are based on the Edexcel style.
(a) Using your own knowledge and the evidence of Sources B, D and E, why did the US and
USSR fail to reach a satisfactory settlement in Europe between the end of the Second
World War and 1949? (10)
(b) ‘The Cold War was not wholly caused by either the US or USSR, but more by a mutual
misunderstanding of each other’s intentions.’ Using your own knowledge and the evidence
from all five sources, explain how far you would agree with this interpretation. (20)
(a) At the end of the Second World War the USSR controlled almost all European territory east of a line
running roughly down the centre of Germany. The US, Britain and France occupied the western part of
Germany and were dominant in the rest of Western Europe. Agreements at Yalta and Potsdam in 1945
failed to resolve exactly what shape post-war Europe would take. Instead both sides ensured that their own
political and economic systems would operate either side of the divide. As early as 1946 Churchill had
warned that an ‘Iron Curtain’ had descended across Europe.
Source B reflects Soviet suspicion of the West, referring to ‘the US effort to establish world domin-
ance’. Stalin shook off US criticism and established communist regimes in ‘neighbouring countries’, Poland,
Bulgaria, Hungary Romania and Czechoslovakia all falling victim during 1946–8. Stalin also opposed the
reunification of Germany and tried, with the 1948 Berlin blockade, to drive the Western Allies out of West
Berlin. Novikov’s reference to US ‘attempts to secure positions for the penetration of American capital’ in
Eastern Europe explains why Stalin refused Marshall Aid for the states under his control in 1948. This fear
of US economic expansionism made Stalin determined not to give up control of his territories.
Source D recognises Stalin’s point of view. Wallace acknowledged that the US was ‘by far the most
powerful nation in the world’ and saw the ‘hypocritical’ side of playing up the Soviet threat. At this stage
the US was the only power with atomic weapons and Truman, baffled by Soviet lack of cooperation and
the lack of a resolution of the European problem, was aiming aggressive rhetoric at the USSR. Wallace’s
concern that an ‘irrational fear of Russia’ was ‘being systematically built up in the American people’ was
well founded, and by 1947 Truman himself was one of the ‘certain individuals’ to encourage this view.
His ‘Truman Doctrine’, announced in 1947, spoke of the conflict in terms of good versus evil, making
compromise less likely.
SOURCES • 243
1111 Despite the US’s general strength, it had pulled most of its troops out of Europe by 1948, and the
2111 USSR had vast superiority in conventional military forces in Europe. Clifford’s view in Source E that
3 ‘the Soviets could, if they chose, send their army westward through Europe’ and that, in Western Europe,
4111 ‘nobody could stop them’ explains why the US launched the Marshall Plan in 1948 and why, a year
5 later, NATO was formed. The US did not just fear a Soviet invasion of Western Europe but also that the
6 West, economically weak and uncertain after the war, might suffer internal communist revolutions. There
7 was even a secret plan to intervene in France if the government system there collapsed. The USSR, however,
8 saw all these as offensive and expansionist developments and any lingering hopes that a settlement be
9 reached, and Germany be reunified, were finally ended. Germany, Berlin and Europe were rigidly divided
10111 into West and East, an arrangement that would last for 40 years.
1
2 (b) The US and USSR had fought on the same side in the Second World War, and therefore had devel-
3 oped some understanding of each other. Relations were never very cordial, however, and the two
4 superpowers soon disagreed on the problem of post-war Europe. They also had deep-seated ideological
5 differences, capitalism versus communism. These differences did not only help cause the Cold War, they
6 have also influenced historical interpretations of why the Cold War started.
7 In the late 1940s, both sides squarely blamed each other. Sources A, B, C and E are full of angry
8 language about the situation. Kennan (Source A), from his vantage point in Moscow, was in no doubt: the
9 Soviets were ‘fanatics’, seeking the ‘destruction’ of the US way of life and communism was described as a
20111 ‘malignant parasite’ – extraordinary words from a diplomat. At this stage, February 1946, Soviet domin-
1 ance of Eastern Europe was still taking shape and Stalin was insisting that he would ensure democratic
2 elections and free government in the Soviet-occupied states. The USSR’s definition of democracy and
3 freedom seemed different to that of the US though. Kennan’s interpretation of Soviet intentions coloured
4 Truman’s judgement, and his policies during 1947–9 reflected US distrust of the USSR. The US pledged
5 support for Greece and Turkey, refused to pull out of West Berlin and kept the monopoly over the atom
6 bomb. The USSR’s approach to diplomacy did not reassure Truman. Reston’s bemused assessment of Soviet
7 Foreign Minister, Molotov, suggests that the USSR could be blamed for encouraging the US to suspect
8 Soviet intentions. The tennis analogy reflects that well-established rules (for the US at least) were being
9 broken. However, Reston admitted that there were problems on both sides, with ‘different objectives and
30 mentalities’, and ‘totally different methods of negotiation’, meaning that both sides were ‘suspicious of
1 . . . each other’. This would support the ‘mutual misunderstanding’ interpretation in the question.
2 One of the key characteristics of the Cold War was that it went beyond Europe. It was not limited to
3 any one venue or issue but became a worldwide struggle to prevent each other from gaining the upper
4 hand. By the 1950s and 1960s, the Cold War was being fought in Korea, Southeast Asia, Africa and Central
5 America. Novikov’s (Source B) main concern was the question of Europe but, like Kennan before him, he
6 did not hesitate to couch the issue in world terms, referring to ‘the US effort to establish world domin-
7 ance’, and called US pressure in Europe ‘the present policy of the American government’ rather than the
8 limits of its ambition. The USSR’s assumption that the US had plans for economic domination seemed
9 borne out by their plans for German and Japanese recovery based on capitalism and their intervention in
40 Greece, Turkey and, in 1950, Korea. The Truman doctrine policy of ‘containment’ was, in Soviet eyes, an
1 active denial of people’s rights to turn to communism. The firm rhetoric from Truman himself and, as
2 Wallace (Source D) noted, from ‘certain individuals and publications’ did suggest an ‘irrational fear of
3 Russia’ and generated a concern in the USSR, as well as the US, that ‘another war is coming’.
4 By the 1960s, a ‘revisionist’ interpretation of the causes of the Cold War was emerging with a greater
45 likelihood of criticism of the US’s role (see for example LaFeber). The Truman Doctrine, for example,
46 began to be seen in a more cynical context as an attempt by the President to mobilise public opinion in
47 support for US economic investment in Europe, which of course would have to be backed up by military
48 security. Part of this took the form of the Marshall Plan, which Truman had assumed would be unaccept-
49222 able to the USSR from the start. Clifford (Source D) places the Marshall Plan in the context of US security
against Soviet domination of Europe, rather than as humanitarian aid. However, Clifford also notes that
‘the Soviets were very powerful militarily’, and his reference to the need to ‘defend the world’ reflects ‘post-
revisionist’ interpretations, such as those by Hyland and Gaddis, that Stalin had no intention of working
towards good relations and saw US capitalism, as Novikov suggested, as an implacable enemy.
This leads to a conclusion that neither side was free of responsibility for causing the Cold War. Both,
justifiably, saw each other as a threat, although each posed a threat partly because they thought the other
was a threat. The ‘mutual misunderstanding’ was evident in the rhetoric shown in the sources and the
diplomatic failures of the late 1940s. This lack of understanding shaped the Cold War, and was to lead to
world crises such as Berlin and Cuba. The difficulty in settling the European question after the Second
World War hastened the beginning of the Cold War. The ideological differences gave identity to each side.
These factors did not provide the prime cause, though. This lay in the emergence of two superpowers, both
with strong national identities and aspirations, finding themselves in a dominant world position after 1945.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE EDEXCEL FORMAT
(a) Using your own knowledge and the evidence of Sources B and E, assess the impact of the
Second World War’s outcome upon Europe. (10)
(b) ‘The wartime Grand Alliance was doomed to crumble after the death of Roosevelt and the
accession of Truman.’ Using your own knowledge and the evidence from all five Sources,
explain how far you would agree with this interpretation. (20)
2 Public opinion and the Vietnam War
■ Source A: Eleanor Bockman, a middle-aged Atlanta housewife who took part in the October
1969 Moratorium Protest and was interviewed at the time
I think people are thoroughly tired of the war. I think that some middle-class whites are just beginning to
realise the depth of poverty in this country. Older people see the emptiness, the burden of the war. Younger
people see it as a great waste of talent and life. Everybody knows that there is no answer now to the Vietnam
War, but we’ve got to let Nixon know.
■ Source B: Television address by President Nixon, November 1969
I would like to address a word, if I may, to the young people of this nation who are particularly concerned,
and I understand why they are concerned, about this war. I respect your idealism. I share your concern
for peace. I want peace as much as you do. . . . I want to end [the war] so that the energy and dedication
of you, our young people, now too often directed into bitter hatred against those responsible for the
war, can be turned to the great challenges of peace, a better life for all Americans, a better life for all people
on this Earth. . . . And so tonight – to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans, I ask for
your support.
■ Source C: Rennie Davis, anti-war protest leader, recalling anti-Vietnam War protests in a
1996 interview
The large protests that I co-ordinated – there were about 150 national organisations – were united funda-
mentally around a commitment to non-violence. It didn’t mean that there weren’t elements within the
movement that felt more aggressive means were essential to take, but relative to all the major mobilisa-
tions and to anything that represented a real coming together of people and forces, non-violence was an
SOURCES • 245
1111 absolute bedrock to the American movement. . . . I viewed myself, quite honestly, as a patriot, and I viewed
2111 myself as supporting American GIs, and my way of supporting them was to get them out of that senseless
3 war . . .
4111
The capacity of the United States to wage war kind of indiscriminately anywhere in the world, without the
5
American public looking over their shoulders very carefully, I think has been changed forever.
6
7
8 AQA QUESTION FORMAT
9
10111 The questions and answers that follow are based on the AQA style.
1
2 (a) Study Source A and use your own knowledge. How valid are the reasons given by Eleanor
3 Bockman for the widespread popular protests against the Vietnam War? (10)
4 (b) Study Source C and use your own knowledge. How reliable is Source C as evidence of
5 the nature of anti-Vietnam War protests in the US between 1967 and 1970? (10)
6
7 (c) Consult Sources A, B and C and use your own knowledge. ‘The strength of public
8 opinion against the war forced the US to abandon hopes of victory in Vietnam.’
9 Assess the validity of this statement. (20)
20111
1 (a) Bockman’s first reason, that ‘people are thoroughly tired of the war’, seems valid. By October 1969 the
2 ground war in Vietnam had been going on for four-and-a-half years, longer than the US’s involvement in
3 Korea or either of the world wars. Public protest was relatively muted for the first two years, growing in
4 prominence during 1967 and then escalating after the 1968 Tet Offensive. Public opinion as a whole turned
5 against the war after Tet, and the 1969 Moratorium Protest was noticeable for its broad appeal, involving
6 new sections of society that had not protested before, including many ‘older people’ and ‘middle-class
7 whites’ – as Bockman said. The ‘waste of talent and life’ was evident to the US public as over 500,000 US
8 troops had been involved in Vietnam and casualties were close to 40,000 by 1969. Television images of the
9 war, especially the My Lai massacre, and the lack of an end in sight generated despondency in the US,
30 hence the references to ‘emptiness’ and ‘no answer now’. The reference to ‘poverty’ hints at a broader cause
1 of dissatisfaction, the economic and social conditions in the US, problems apparently left unsolved despite
2 Johnson’s ‘Great Society’ promises, while billions of dollars were poured into the Vietnam War. Bockman’s
3 final reason, ‘we’ve got to let Nixon know’, reflected the blame attached to the Presidency for the Vietnam
4 War. Nixon’s predecessor Johnson had started the ground war and a ‘credibility gap’ had subsequently
5 opened up – the public stopped trusting their President. Nixon had promised to end the war but there was
6 no sign of this, other than the announcement of some troop withdrawals and reduction in bombing, by
7 October 1969. All of the reasons given by Bockman are relevant.
8 However, there are other reasons for the popular protests not mentioned by Bockman. The war, and
9 poverty, were not the only factors leading to protest. There was a trend in the 1960s towards vocal protest,
40 especially among the young. The civil rights campaign also brought active protest into popular political
1 culture. The late 1960s saw a ‘flower power’ hippy movement, which found anti-Vietnam War protest an
2 important focus for anti-establishment and anti-war attitudes. Finally, most controversial was the use of
3 conscription for the Vietnam War, arguably a breach of human rights; burning draft cards was a popular
4 form of protest.
45
46 (b) Source C makes three main points about the nature of anti-Vietnam War protests. First, the protests
47 were widespread and popular. Davis claims there to have been ‘about 150 national organisations’. Second,
48 the protests were, in the main, peaceful and committed to ‘non-violence’, although he admits to ‘elements
49222 in the movement’ who supported ‘more aggressive means.’ Third, the protests to some extent had
patriotic rather than purely pacifist motives behind them, Davis saying ‘I viewed myself, quite honestly, as
a patriot’. All of these points taken together cast the anti-Vietnam War protests in a very inclusive and
populist light, not the work of an extreme minority against the true wishes of ‘the great silent majority’
referred to by Nixon in Source B.
The authorship of the Source would lead us to expect bias and therefore a lack of reliability. Rennie
Davis was not a neutral observer but a leading figure in the 1960s protests, who was controversially impris-
oned for his role in protests in Chicago in 1968. He clearly opposed the war passionately as he did not just
participate in, he ‘co-ordinated’ protests. It would therefore be expected that he strongly supported the
protests and would emphasise their popularity. Although he was speaking in 1996, many years after the
end of the protests and the war, he would still have an eye on history’s assessment of the protests, and
his own role, since the 1960s. The issue of patriotism is pertinent as conservative assessments of the Vietnam
War since its end (such as that by Ronald Reagan, for example) viewed it as a patriotic and just struggle,
lost due to a lack of will within the US, implicitly blaming the anti-war protests. There is a lack of proper
reference to the more aggressive aspects of the protests. This all points towards Source C being unreliable
evidence.
However, much of the content of Source C is supported by the other Sources as well as our know-
ledge of anti-Vietnam War protests. Davis calls the war ‘senseless’ and the protests ‘a real coming together
of people’. Eleanor Bockman spoke of the ‘emptiness’ of the war and suggested that people of different
ages and social groups were brought together by opposition to the war. Certainly the 1969 Moratorium
Protest was supported by millions across the US. The number and popularity of different protests during
1968–70 (perhaps less so in 1967) again supports Davis’s assessment that the protests were well supported.
And Nixon’s television address (Source B) seems to bear out Davis’s comment on how US foreign policy
makers would have to pay closer attention to public opinion thereafter. Davis also admits that there were
some ‘aggressive means’ although he underplays the real extent of violence and militancy. On this basis,
then, the content of Source C is fairly reliable. However, it does not cover all issues relating to the nature
of anti-Vietnam War protests, for example the sharing of the anti-war message with wider human rights
and even revolutionary causes.
(c) Even before his election in 1968 Nixon believed that complete victory was not possible. The best policy,
in his view, was to gradually withdraw US involvement from Vietnam and seek an honourable compro-
mise peace with North Vietnam. Given the sheer economic and military might of the US, this seems at first
sight an extraordinary statement, and hostile public opinion might be one explanation why Nixon felt he
could not bring the full extent of US power to the war. There are, however, other contributory factors.
Source A supports the view that public opinion was strongly against the war. Bockman’s statement
‘we’ve got to let Nixon know’ suggests that this public opinion had not yet influenced Nixon. In fact Nixon
was already well aware of public hostility to the war, as Johnson had been before him. Johnson had decided
not to seek re-election in 1968 due to public dismay at how the Vietnam War was progressing (the Tet
Offensive especially upset public opinion) and Nixon had already begun his ‘Vietnamization’ programme,
withdrawing US troops piecemeal from Vietnam, before October 1969. Source B does provide evidence
that Nixon was very conscious of public opinion, although he did claim that ‘the great silent majority’
supported his gradual approach to ending the war.
Although Nixon implied that only a minority actively opposed his continuation of the Vietnam War,
Source C suggests that anti-war protests were in fact very widespread and were organised to the extent that
‘about 150 national organisations’ actively campaigned to stop the war. This was not enough to force the
US to pull out of Vietnam immediately, nor did it prevent Nixon from broadening and intensifying the
bombing campaigns against the Viet Cong during 1970–1. However, it did make an increase in the number
of US ground troops politically impossible. This, together with the failure of Nixon’s ‘Vietnamization’ policy
(the South Vietnamese troops were never strong enough to defeat the Viet Cong alone) forced the US to
abandon victory hopes.
1111 This all contrasts with the optimistic mood of the US government in 1965 when ground troops were
2111 first sent in. It was only after the war had dragged on for two or three years that anti-war protests really
3 became a factor against victory. Political and military miscalculations prevented victory in the first two
4111 years. After that the sense of war weariness, indicated in Source A (‘people are thoroughly tired of the war’)
5 and Source C (‘get them out of that senseless war’), took hold and undermined the continuation of the
6 war. The nature of the war also made it hard to pursue: the US was not capturing territory but attempting
7 to clear areas of Viet Cong infiltration. There was plenty of violence and bloodshed but little evidence,
8 other than dead Vietnamese, of any military progress. From this came a feeling of ‘waste’ (Source A) and
9 ‘senseless war’ (Source C). Nixon himself admitted (or pretended to admit): ‘I understand why they [young
10111 people] are concerned about this war.’ From 1967 onwards, victory became increasingly unlikely, in part
1 due to public opinion against the war.
2 There were other reasons, not mentioned in any of the Sources, which help to explain why the US had
3 to abandon hopes of victory in Vietnam. The ‘military miscalculations’ mentioned earlier included inef-
4 fective deployment of the air force and ground troops, for example the troops were unused to guerrilla
5 warfare and General Westmoreland’s ‘search and destroy’ policy lacked the subtlety needed to outwit the
6 Viet Cong. It also must not be assumed that it was up to the US to win or lose the war. The Viet Cong
7 and their suppliers, North Vietnam, were well organised and tenacious. Soviet equipment and supplies were
8
deployed effectively – the only exception being the 1968 Tet Offensive, but even this was a psychological
9
masterstroke against a faltering US. Finally, North Vietnam’s refusal to negotiate a compromise settlement
20111
before 1973, by which time Nixon was really desperate to end the war, made an advantageous solution to
1
the war impossible for the US.
2
3
4 ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE AQA FORMAT
5
(a) Study Source C and use your own knowledge. How valid are the reasons given in Source C
6
for public support of anti-war protests? (10)
7
8 (b) Study Source B and use your own knowledge. How reliable is Source B as evidence of
9 Nixon’s conduct of the Vietnam War during 1969–72? (10)
30
1 (c) Consult Sources A, B and C and use your own knowledge. ‘Anti-Vietnam War protests were
2 mostly the work of a radical minority and not representative of US public opinion as a
3 whole.’ Assess the validity of this statement. (20)
4
5
7
8
9 1 Investigating Cold War case studies
40
1 Choose one or more of the following events of the Cold War. Undertake further research on it and then,
2 either individually or in pairs, produce two short written descriptions of the event, one showing the US’s
3 perspective, and the other showing the USSR’s perspective:
4
45 • the Marshall Plan, 1948; • the Cuban missile crisis, 1962;
46 • the Berlin blockade, 1948; • the ‘Christmas bombing’ of Hanoi, 1972;
47 • the US intervention in Korea, 1950; • the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, 1979;
48 • the Hungarian uprising, 1956; • the Reykjavik Summit, 1986.
49222 • the building of the Berlin Wall, 1961;
2 The Cold War and US culture
Use the Internet or other resources to find out more about US culture in the Cold War. This could include
the following:
• Films – Hollywood sci-fi films (e.g. Invasion of the Body Snatchers) as 1950s allegories for the commu-
nist threat; Vietnam films (e.g. The Green Berets, Apocalypse Now) as indicators of different political
interpretations of the Vietnam War.
• Sport – the Fischer/Spassky chess world championship in 1972; the boycotted Moscow Olympics in
1980.
Stephen E. Ambrose and Douglas G. Brinkley, Rise to Walter LaFeber, America, Russia and the Cold War,
Globalism, 8th edition, Penguin (1997). 1945–2000, 9th edition, McGraw-Hill (2002).
S.J. Ball, The Cold War, Arnold (1998). Martin McCauley, Russia, America and the Cold War
Mark S. Byrnes, The Truman Years 1945–1953, Pearson 1949–1991, Pearson (1998).
(2000). John W. Mason, The Cold War 1945–1991, Routledge
David A. Deese (ed.), The New Politics of American Foreign (1996).
Policy, St Martin’s Press (1994). David Mervin, The President of the United States, Harvester
J.P.D. Dunbabin, The Cold War, Pearson (1994). Wheatsheaf (1993).
Niall Ferguson, Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Richard Sobel, The Impact of Public Opinion on US Foreign
Empire, Penguin (2004). Policy Since Vietnam, Oxford University Press (2001).
T.G. Fraser and Donette Murray, America and the World Robert D. Schulzinger, US Diplomacy Since 1900, 5th
since 1945, Palgrave (2002). edition, Oxford University Press (2002).
John L. Gaddis, The Long Peace: Inquiries into the History John Traynor, Mastering Modern United States History,
of the Cold War, Oxford University Press (1987). Palgrave (2001).
John L. Gaddis, We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War
History, Oxford University Press (1997).
Fraser J. Harbutt, The Cold War Era, Blackwell (2002). There are also numerous excellent web sites available. Two
William G. Hyland, The Cold War: Fifty Years of Conflict, good starting points are:
Times Books (1991).
Michael Kort, The Columbia Guide to the Cold War, www.americanpresident.org
Columbia University Press (1998). www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 10
5
6
7
8
9 Civil Rights, 1863–2001
10111
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111
1 This chapter will look at the struggle for civil rights in the United States between 1863 and
2 2001. African Americans will provide the primary focus, but other groups such as Native
3 Americans, Hispanic Americans, Japanese Americans and Chinese Americans will also be
4 considered.
5
6
8
9 Introduction 1 Responses to Plessy v. Ferguson
30 The Civil War, 1861–1865 2 Responses to Brown v. Board of
1 Reconstruction, 1865–1877 Education
2 Race relations and civil rights, 1877–1917
3 The inter-war years, 1919–1941
4 The impact of the Second World War, Historical skills
5 1941–1945
6 The beginnings of the civil rights movement, 1 Role play: a television debate on whether
7 1945–1960 to make Martin Luther King’s birthday a
8 Civil rights, 1960–1968 national holiday in the US
9 American race relations, 1968–2001 2 Using numbers: analysis of the average
40 Conclusion income of persons with earned income,
1 by race and sex
2 3 Mind maps
3 Essays 4 Hot seating: assuming a role and answering
4 questions
45 Reconstruction and after
46 African Americans and Native Americans
47 Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois
48 Civil rights in the 1950s and 1960s
49222
250 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
Chronology
1863 Emancipation Proclamation

1866 Freedmen’s Bureau established
Civil War ended
1866 Civil Rights Act
The Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution abolished slavery
Reconstruction Act
1868 The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution granted citizenship to all persons
born in the US
1869 Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution protected citizens’ right to vote
1872 Civil Rights Act of 1866 found to be unconstitutional
1877 End of Reconstruction
1881 The First Jim Crow Law passed in Tennessee
1882 The Chinese Exclusion Act
1887 The Dawes Act gave Native Americans land if they renounced tribal allegiance
1896 Plessy v. Ferguson established ‘separate but equal’
1909 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) founded
1919 Riots in ‘Red Summer’
1920 The Nineteenth Amendment gave women the vote
1921 Quota Act
1924 National Origins Act – all Native Americans given rights of citizenship
1934 Indian Reorganization Act
1942 Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) founded
1943 Riots in Harlem, Detroit and Alabama
1948 US armed forces desegregated
1954 Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas
1955 Segregation on interstate transport banned
Montgomery Bus Boycott began
Central High School, Little Rock, Arkansas: integration stopped by riots
1960 Student Non-violent Co-ordinating Committee launched
1961 Freedom Rides organised by CORE
1963 Demonstrations in Birmingham, Alabama
March on Washington
1964 Martin Luther King Jr won Nobel Peace Prize
Civil Rights Act
Riots in New York, Philadelphia and Chicago
1965 Malcolm X assassinated
Voting Rights Act
Rise of Black Power
Riots in Watts district of Los Angeles
1967 National Organization of Women set up
Loving v. Virginia
Riots in Chicago, Detroit and Cambridge, Maryland
Martin Luther King assassinated
1111
2111 Chronology
3
4111 1967 Civil Rights Act
5 American Indian Movement founded
6 1974 Indian Self Development Act
7 1977 Roots broadcast to an estimated audience of 130 million television viewers
8 1982 The birthday of Martin Luther King Jr declared a national holiday
9 1984 Jesse Jackson ran for Democratic nomination for President
10111 1988 Civil Rights Restoration Act
1 1991 Rodney King incident
2 1992 LA Riots left 55 dead
3 1995 Supreme Court attacked desegregation in schools
4 Louis Farrakhan’s Million Man March on Washington DC
5
6
7
8
20111
1
2 Introduction
3
4 Civil rights are those rights that citizens are entitled to expect in a free society. They include the right to
5 vote, the right to equality of opportunity and the right to receive the protection of the law. However, for
6 the majority of Americans their history is a history of the struggle to achieve civil rights. It could be argued
7 that in the ‘Land of the Free’ only white, Protestant males of North European origin, who spoke English
8 and possessed capital were truly free to enjoy their civil rights. All other groups were disadvantaged and
9 had to fight institutional racism and sexism in order to achieve their freedom.
30 At the outbreak of the Civil War, most African Americans were slaves, Native Americans had been
1 moved from their homelands, the majority of Hispanic Americans were trapped in low-paid employment,
2 recent immigrants from Europe were living in eastern ghettos, Chinese Americans were the victims of racist
3 attacks, and many women contented themselves with a supporting role for their families. All these groups
4 were kept socially, politically and economically inferior to the American elite.
5 The Civil War was a catalyst for change, and from 1863 to 1870 American society changed consider-
6 ably. At this time great strides were made by African Americans in their quest for civil rights but, as the
7 century progressed, many of these gains were eroded and by the outbreak of the Second World War millions
8 of Americans were still denied social, political and economic equality. However, things did eventually
9 improve and the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s is widely regarded as a success. Consequently,
40 by the 1970s the majority of Americans enjoyed their legal and political rights to a greater extent than any
1 of their ancestors. Whether they had all their civil rights, though, is a matter for debate.
2
3
4 The Civil War, 1861–1865
45
46 The Civil War was not fought to free slaves. When it began Lincoln had no intention of emancipating
47 African Americans. His attitude is reflected in the fact that the first Confiscation Act (1861) recognised
48 slaves as property but did not give them freedom. His views can also be seen in his actions and words. In
49222 1861 and 1862 he dismissed three Union commanding officers for trying to free slaves and late in 1862
252 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
he said: ‘If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it . . . .’ However, as losses increased
and the need for more soldiers intensified, and this was coupled with both a fear of foreign intervention
on behalf of the South and Lincoln’s desire to strengthen his own position, the war to preserve the Union
became regarded as a war to end slavery.
The Emancipation Proclamation took effect from 1 January 1863. The Union could now use African
American soldiers in its ranks while also gaining the propaganda issue it required to keep the South isolated.
However, many white soldiers would not fight alongside black soldiers so African American regiments were
formed. These regiments were put into situations where they suffered heavy losses, black soldiers were paid
less than white soldiers, and if they were captured they were not treated as prisoners of war. In addition
to this, the recruitment of former slaves was bitterly resented by immigrants from Europe, leading to
riots in Northern cities. In the summer of 1863, for example, over 1,000 people were killed or injured
in a riot in New York. It can be seen, then, that although the slaves were now free, there was still a great
deal of racism in the US and that equality had not yet been achieved.
Reconstruction, 1865–1877
By the end of the war, the Confederate states were ruined and the new President, Andrew Johnson, was
faced with the problems of how to restore unity to the United States while also determining the future and
status of several million freed slaves. Between 1865 and 1867 he embarked upon a process of Presidential
Reconstruction but he was regarded as being too sympathetic to the former Confederates and soon lost the
support of his Party.
Most of the newly elected Southern assemblies refused to ratify the 13th Amendment while also refusing
to give the vote to even a proportion of freed slaves. In addition to this, they introduced Black Codes
which withheld African American rights to vote, serve on a jury, give evidence against a white person, carry
arms, or marry a white person. African Americans had heavier penalties imposed on them if they broke
the law, they were forced to enter labour contracts with their former employers and, if they remained
unemployed, they could be hired out to plantation owners as a punishment for vagrancy.
Radicals in the Republican Party pushed for change. They supported the work of the Freedmen’s Bureau
and overrode Johnson’s veto of the Civil Rights Act of 1866. They secured the 14th Amendment, which
stated that all persons born or naturalised in the United States were citizens, while declaring that any state
that denied the vote to any male citizen would have its representatives in Congress reduced. This was a
direct attack on the Black Codes.
A period of Congressional Reconstruction followed. A series of Reconstruction Acts was passed between
1867 and 1868, which invalidated state governments who had refused to ratify the 14th Amendment. This
was supported by the 15th Amendment (1870), which was intended to ensure that African Americans were
given the vote throughout the US and the Civil Rights Act (1875) which aimed to prohibit segregation in
public places (except schools).
However, the Civil Rights Act was never enforced, the 15th Amendment did not preclude the impo-
sition of voting qualifications, and there was no guarantee that former slaves or their descendants could
hold office. African Americans suffered attacks from the Ku Klux Klan, the police and recent immigrants
from Europe. In addition to this, thousands of African Americans remained in the poverty trap, many were
illiterate and few owned land.
In 1877 federal troops were removed from the South and the policies of Reconstruction, which were
already weakened, were finally abandoned. African Americans in the South were now at the mercy of state
legislatures who were allowed to pursue policies of segregation and discrimination unimpeded by federal
intervention.
1111
2111 Race relations and civil rights, 1877–1917
3
4111 African Americans
5
By 1877 African Americans had ‘stood for a brief moment in the sun’. They had tasted freedom, re-
6
established the family unit and seen their churches become important social and political institutions.
7
They had gained some civil rights, but these were beginning to be eroded.
8
In 1883 the Supreme Court declared that the Civil Rights Act (1875) was unconstitutional. In 1890 a
9
bill to provide federal supervision of elections in the South to stop African Americans being intimidated
10111
was blocked. During the 1890s loopholes in the interpretation of the 15th Amendment were exploited, ‘Jim
1
Crow’ laws were introduced and African Americans continued to suffer violence while also being kept in
2
a state of poverty.
3
As a result of this, the number of African Americans registered to vote fell considerably and, with the
4
Supreme Court’s decision in Plessy v. Ferguson, the notion of ‘separate but equal’ became firmly estab-
5
lished in the South.
6
In the North, where increasing numbers of Southern African Americans had migrated, things were
7
little better. African Americans suffered discrimination, often lived in ghettoes, were excluded from skilled
8
employment and trade union membership and endured high infant mortality rates.
9
Despite this, men such as W.E.B. Du Bois were working to change things. Du Bois demanded full civil
20111
rights, the end of segregation, the extension of the franchise, and equality of opportunity in all aspects of
1
life and work. He became involved in the first civil rights movement when he joined forces with other
2
activists in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). He edited the
3
NAACP’s magazine, The Crisis, and through it he campaigned against lynching, ‘Jim Crow’ laws and sexual
4
inequality.
5
6
7 Native Americans
8
By 1877 most Native Americans were forced to live on reservations, they were dependent on the white
9
man’s generosity, denied the annual payments that they had been promised in return for their land, and
30
deprived of the rights and liberties of US citizens.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
40
1
2
3
4
45
46
47
48 Figure 10.1
49222 Public hanging in Kentucky
254 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
The Dawes Act (1887) divided up reservation land and allocated sections of it to the head of each
Native American family. It also gave Native Americans the full protection of federal law. However, Native
Americans were still forced to live on the poorest land and they suffered hunger, disease and hardship.
They were often treated with contempt and they were segregated from the rest of the population. In addi-
tion to this, their children were sent away to boarding schools as the US government attempted to destroy
their culture.
Chinese Americans
Chinese Americans were deprived of their civil rights. They suffered discrimination and hatred and they
were often made scapegoats in times of unemployment and unrest. They were forced to live in their own
areas of cities, particularly in western states, and they were not allowed to become naturalised. In 1882
Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act which banned Chinese immigration for ten years. Chinese
Americans suffered a great deal as a result of their lack of civil rights.
Hispanic Americans
As the US acquired land from Mexico, many Hispanic Americans took their place in American society.
Some of these were wealthy landowners and they were readily accepted in the social circles of white
Americans. However, many poorer, dark-skinned Hispanics became itinerant agricultural labourers and
were denied their civil rights. Later, other Hispanic workers came from Mexico, Puerto Rico and Cuba.
Many of these people were short-term seasonal workers who were easily repatriated at times of racial tension.
Very few of them gained the rights and privileges enjoyed by other US citizens.
European Americans
As the US continued to industrialise, many immigrants came from Europe. They were frequently illiterate
and lacked bargaining power. Many of them worked long hours in dangerous conditions for low pay,
however, there were no barriers to European Americans becoming American citizens. Nonetheless, because
many of these new immigrants came from southern and eastern Europe, they did face discrimination and
intimidation and the government did little to guarantee their civil rights.
Conclusion
By 1917 interracial violence and hostility were commonplace. All ethnic minorities endured poverty and
discrimination and there was no political will to address the issue of civil rights.
The inter-war years, 1919–1941
African Americans and Native Americans who fought in the First World War gained a glimpse of greater
equality, but, when they returned home, white resentment at competition for jobs and housing led to race
riots in twenty-five American cities and towns in 1919. In addition to this, German Americans faced hostility
that lasted for some time after the war, and African Americans, Catholics, Jews, trade union members, and
anyone suspected of subversion became victims of the reformed Ku Klux Klan.
On 1 January 1920, 6,000 ‘aliens’ were rounded up and imprisoned or expelled from the US and, in
the same year, Prohibition came into force. Opponents of the ban on the production, transportation and
consumption of alcohol argued that it was an infringement of civil rights, but Prohibition was regarded by
many as an attack on the foreign immigrants who were blamed for the vice, crime and drunkenness that
1111 took place in the US. It was certainly fuelled by anti-German feeling as the wealth and political influence
2111 of many German brewers was resented. Prohibition definitely showed that the federal government and the
3 courts were now more willing to extend their power over ordinary citizens, and their actions could also be
4111 seen as an attack on civil rights.
5 Other examples of institutionalised racism can be found in the Quota Act (1921) and the National
6 Origins Act (1924). Limitations were placed on the number of southern and eastern Europeans who were
7 allowed to enter the country and, after 1924, Asian immigrants were excluded completely.
8 However, there were some gains during this period: Native Americans were given rights of citizenship
9 (1924) and the 19th Amendment (1919) gave women the vote. The ‘Harlem Renaissance’ produced
10111 talented musicians, such as Louis Armstrong and ‘Duke’ Ellington, and writers, such as Langston Hughes,
1 who challenged racism and championed freedom and equality.
2 Despite divisions among some African Americans, there was an increased awareness of cultural iden-
3 tity and the rights to which they were entitled. During the Depression black workers began to join trade
4 unions, which was an important step in the quest for civil rights. It gave African Americans both an increased
5 awareness of their rights and greater confidence to pursue them. African Americans influenced the New
6 Deal through the ‘black cabinet’, and the NAACP continued to encourage ordinary African Americans to
7 organise and assert themselves, to use the courts to challenge discrimination, and to fight against inequality
8 in education provisions and funding. At this time the African American vote, where it existed, switched
9 decisively from the Republicans to the Democrats.
20111
1
2
3 The impact of the Second World War, 1941–1945
4
5
African Americans
6
7 The Second World War increased African American consciousness. Black soldiers were seen as equal on
8 the front line, but at military parades, in church services, transportation and in the canteens they were
9 segregated from white soldiers. In addition to this, the irony of fighting the racism of the Nazis while African
30 Americans were suffering similar treatment in the Southern states was not lost on the black troops. As a
1 result of this, the African American press began to campaign for ‘Double V’ : victory against racism at
2 home and abroad.
3 As the war progressed, the demand for labour gave black workers greater bargaining power and the
4 membership of the NAACP increased from 50,000 to 450,000. A. Philip Randolph’s proposed march on
5 Washington led to the establishment of the Fair Employment Practices Commission and James Farmer
6 established the Congress of Racial Equality which used non-violent tactics such as sit-ins in order to chal-
7 lenge segregation.
8 However, the majority of African Americans still lived in poverty and suffered racism and discrimi-
9 nation. There was considerable racial tension, illustrated by the race riots in Detroit and Harlem in the
40 summer of 1943, but there was increased awareness and activism. These were both drawn upon as the
1 campaign for civil rights matured after the War.
2
3
Native Americans
4
45 Native Americans played a significant part in the Second World War. Navajo soldiers, for example, used
46 their own language as a radio code in the war in the Pacific. The Japanese were never able to decipher it.
47 In 1944 the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) was formed. It intended to launch a series
48 of legal cases to establish rights such as equal educational opportunity. However, the main aim of most
49222 Native Americans was to improve their standard of living and maintain their distinctive identity.
256 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
Japanese Americans
The war led to a direct attack on the civil rights of Japanese Americans, particularly on the west coast.
Japanese assets on the US mainland were frozen, a curfew was imposed against them and in March 1942
over 100,000 Japanese Americans were interned in ‘relocation camps’.
Hispanic Americans
During the war many Mexicans were encouraged to provide the US with cheap labour. They were not
allowed to vote and they were denied basic civil rights. In addition to this, they were the victims of riots
in Los Angeles.
Conclusion
The Second World War increased the awareness of civil rights issues for a number of groups. African
American organisations were now using a ‘combination of co-operation, coercion and confrontation when
dealing with whites’ (Sanders 2000) and the federal government was beginning to act in a way that benefited
African Americans. The seeds had been sown for future civil rights developments.
The beginnings of the civil rights movement, 1945–1960
After the war, many African American troops returned home looking for an end to segregation. The NAACP
began challenging the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine of Plessy v. Ferguson, the number of African Americans
registered to vote increased and a number of states adopted fair employment practices. President Truman
set up the Committee on Civil Rights in 1946, which established civil rights as a moral issue and he ended
discrimination in the US military.
However, Southern racism, the continuation of attacks by the Ku Klux Klan, anti-communist feeling
and the issue of states’ rights all restricted progress until Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the
Montgomery Bus Boycott (1956) and Little Rock (1957).
In Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, the Supreme Court led by Earl Warren found that African
Americans should be given an equal educational chance and that segregation should end in schools.
However, no time scale was set and nothing was done to set standards in schools. In addition to this,
President Eisenhower failed to take any meaningful action to enforce the verdict and the Southern Manifesto
was drafted to fight the judgement. Despite this, a legal precedent had been set and many places outside
the Deep South began to integrate.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott began with the prosecution of Rosa Parks, who had refused to give up
her bus seat for a white man. To coincide with her trial African Americans boycotted buses in Montgomery
demanding a more polite service from the white bus drivers, the employment of black drivers and the end
of black passengers standing when the bus was not full. When these demands were refused, the boycotters
began to insist on total integration. As the protest continued and a legal and constitutional challenge took
place, the Supreme Court eventually confirmed that bus segregation was unconstitutional (1956).
The boycott was significant because it showed the African American community could be encouraged
to take action for themselves. It illustrated that solidarity and discipline were virtues that could lead to
success and it was a sustained mass protest involving all sections of the black community. It introduced a
new leader, Martin Luther King, a new organisation, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC),
and a new philosophy, non-violent protest. It drew the attention of the North to segregation in the South
and it raised the question of federal response to segregation. In short, it was a vital event in the history of
civil rights in America.
1111 On 3 September 1957, nine African American students had attempted to take their places at Central
2111 High School, Little Rock, Arkansas. The governor of Arkansas ordered the National Guard to bar their way,
3 as he had no intention of complying with the Brown v. Board of Education verdict. Eventually, Eisenhower
4111 intervened and used the National Guard to escort the children into school. They remained there for a year.
5 This was significant because the President had used his federal authority to uphold the Brown verdict.
6
7
8 Civil rights, 1960–1968
9
10111 The year 1960 saw the launch of the Student Non-Violent Co-ordinating Committee (SNCC) and the
1 revival of the Congress of Racial Equality. It also saw a dramatic increase in non-violent protest. On 1
2 February a sit-in took place in a branch of Woolworth’s in Greensboro, North Carolina. It proved to be a
3 successful way of protesting against segregation and it was imitated throughout the US. It also led to a shift
4 in public opinion as television showed peaceful African American students being arrested by the police
5 while the violent acts of white people opposed to the sit-ins were ignored by the police. Viewers could draw
6 their own conclusions.
7 In 1961 CORE organised freedom rides with the intention of creating a crisis. A group of integrated
8 passengers planned to take an interstate bus trip from the North to the South in order to test whether
9 Southern states could impose segregation on interstate journeys. They hoped that if they were allowed to
20111 continue to travel together, then segregation would have received another blow. However, they also knew
1 that if they were attacked then media attention would force the federal government to act. They got their
2 wish in Birmingham, Alabama, where they were attacked and then interviewed. Following this, an injunc-
3 tion was brought against those who had been attacking the freedom riders. Federal Marshals were sent
4 to Montgomery and Robert Kennedy, the US Attorney-
5 General, organised the desegregation of all interstate travel. Figure 10.2 Muhammad Ali addresses the
6 Educational segregation was also challenged in Black Muslim Annual Convention, 1968
7 Alabama, and also, most notably, by James Meredith in
8 Mississippi. Protests led by Martin Luther King campaigned
9 for desegregation in public places while also attempting to
30 get more African American people to register to vote.
1 However, more careful planning and coordination were still
2 needed.
3 The campaigning, marches and speeches of 1963–5 saw
4 the high point of the civil rights movement. Militant non-
5 violent campaigns such as the ones in Birmingham and
6 Selma, Alabama, were successful. The march on Washing-
7 ton emphasised the peaceful and multiracial nature of the
8 movement, and the passing of civil rights legislation, such
9 as the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights
40 Act, also made it a time of tangible success. Two successive
1 Presidents, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, were
2 regarded as being committed to the movement’s aims and
3 Martin Luther King’s reputation was at its height. However,
4 probably most importantly, public opinion was moving
45 even further towards racial equality and the issue of civil
46 rights in America had become an international news story.
47 By the close of 1965, though, there were clear signs of
48 tension and division in the movement. The SNCC were
49222 becoming increasingly critical of Martin Luther King and
258 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
the SCLC, and despite the political and legal gains made by some African Americans, many black people
were concerned about the lack of social and economic reform that had taken place. In this climate the idea
of Black Power and the views of Malcolm X became increasingly popular. As a result of this, and the riots
that took place in the long hot summers of 1965, 1966 and 1967, some of the sympathy that the move-
ment had gained from liberal whites and the federal government began to decline.
By the time of King’s death in April 1968 the civil rights movement was weakened and divided.
Segregation remained in public places in some parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina,
and black voter registration remained lower than white. However, more African Americans were registered
to vote, segregation had largely disappeared in public places (with certain exceptions in parts of the Deep
South), more transport systems and some schools were integrated, African Americans were rising to high
office in many careers, ‘Red Power’ and ‘Brown Power’ had been inspired by the Black Power movement,
and the principle of equal rights and opportunities had been accepted by the majority of the American
public.
American race relations, 1968–2001
With the death of Martin Luther King, the civil rights movement lost the sense of being a national move-
ment. ‘Jim Crow’ had been destroyed but the problems of inner-city deprivation, drug abuse, rural poverty,
job discrimination and segregated schools remained. These problems, which were shared with other groups,
particularly Native Americans and Hispanic Americans, could only be tackled by increased participation
in politics and federal intervention: Presidential policies
and local activism were both vital in this period.
Figure 10.3 Black athletes giving the Black African American organisations such as the NAACP
Power salute during the Olympic Games, influenced politics in the US throughout the 1970s and
1968 1980s, while the work of black politicians, such as Jesse
Jackson, served as an example of how much progress had
been made by African Americans in the field of politics.
However, by 1992 African Americans were still suffer-
ing racism and discrimination. The tension that this
caused manifested itself in the riots that erupted in South
Central Los Angeles following the exoneration, by a white
jury, of four white police officers who had been filmed
beating an African American named Rodney King. The
55 deaths, 2,100 injuries and 9,000 arrests symbolised
how much there was that still needed to be addressed
in American society.
Clinton promoted many blacks to high office, but
failed in his attempts to push through health legislation
which would have helped ethnic groups, and by Novem-
ber 1999 there were, once again, no black senators in
Congress. By the end of the 1990s, high schools were
still holding segregated graduation parties, and there
were nearly 800,000 black men in American prisons,
compared with just over 600,000 in higher education.
Calls for financial compensation for blacks for the years
of slavery largely fell on deaf ears; and, in 1999, the killing
of black West African immigrant Amadou Diallo by four
police officers, who fired 41 bullets at him as he reached
ESSAYS • 259
1111 for his wallet, and the subsequent Bruce Springsteen song ‘American Skin’, showed that racial issues could
2111 still be explosive. At the 2000 Presidential election, 90 per cent of the black vote went to the Democrat
3 candidate Al Gore, along with 62 per cent of the ‘Latino’ vote.
4111
5
6 Conclusion
7
8 It can be seen, then, that despite over 100 years of struggle, civil rights remains a pertinent issue.
9 The gradual rise of the civil rights movement showed that American ideas of democracy and equality
10111 of opportunity could not be withheld by the traditional elite forever. Against huge odds, and with enor-
1 mous courage, civil rights protesters did force the federal government to protect their right to vote and
2 to be treated equally in the workplace and in education. However, deep-rooted attitudes have taken longer
3 to change and African Americans and other minority groups in the United States still continue to encounter
4 many economic and social problems in their everyday lives: only the consent of the traditional elite or a
5 revolution can change this situation.
6
7
8
Part 2: Essays
9
20111
1 Reconstruction and after
2
3 1 What were the aims of Reconstruction and how far were they achieved? (20)
4 (AQA)
5
6 The Civil War, by its very nature, radically altered the United States. The loss of life, the destruction of
7 property, the creation of resentment, the emancipation of the slaves, and the defeat of the South, all created
8 the opportunity for further change. This change needed to be managed and Reconstruction is the term
9 used to describe this process. It can be argued that the principal aim for all of those who were involved
30 in Reconstruction was to manage the inevitable rebuilding of the United States that the Civil War had
1 necessitated.
2 The war had been fought to preserve the Union, so the peace also needed to ensure this. However, it
3 had also led to the emancipation of several million slaves and those involved in Reconstruction needed
4 to consider how to deal with this situation. These were difficult issues and the possible approaches to
5 Reconstruction as well as the specific aims of the individuals involved would be quite different.
6 Most Northern politicians wanted to restore the Union and ensure loyalty to the United States. They
7 wanted the US to function as one political and economic force, to which all the individual states contributed.
8 They also wanted to ensure that they would still be elected and so maintain their positions of power. These
9 politicians therefore might alter their stance to suit the electorate they needed to appeal to.
40 Other politicians though might be more principled. The Radical Republicans were committed to
1 securing the vote for freedmen while also punishing the former Confederate states for secession. They
2 wanted to ban all ex-Confederates from politics and imprison all civil and military leaders. Men such as
3 Thaddeus Stevens campaigned for the immediate extension of civil rights to African Americans and the
4 work of Radical Republicans in Congress led to the establishment of the Freedmen’s Bureau, the Civil Rights
45 Act of 1866 and the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution.
46 Moderate Republicans though were determined to limit the rights given to former slaves, and President
47 Johnson even attempted to veto the Civil Rights Act. His aims were very different to those of the radical
48 wing of his party. Johnson was willing to grant a pardon to almost all Southerners who were willing
49222 to swear an oath of allegiance to the Union. If they did this, and agreed to the ratification of the 13th
260 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
Amendment, they were allowed to vote and stand for election to the state assemblies. They were to have
all their property, except slaves, restored to them and consequently many rich Southern plantation owners,
politicians and army officers were able to maintain their positions of power. It can be seen, then, that
Johnson’s aim was to preserve the Union by refusing to further alienate the South. He certainly had
little regard for ensuring that African Americans were granted their civil rights and he was also reluctant
to seek retribution for secession. His attitude probably helped to preserve the Union but it did little to help
former slaves.
Reconstruction did manage the change precipitated by the Civil War because it preserved the Union.
However, although some former Confederates were punished and some gains were made by African
Americans, these were both short-lived. Johnson pardoned approximately 13,000 former Confederates, he
abandoned the intention to charge with treason and punish Southern politicians and army officers, he
allowed rich planters to continue to hold office, and he failed to force newly elected state assemblies to
ratify the 13th Amendment. He also allowed the state legislatures to introduce Black Codes, which denied
African Americans the right to vote, serve on a jury, give evidence against a white person, carry arms or
marry a white person.
Congress attempted to destroy the Black Codes through the Freedmen’s Bureau, the Civil Rights
Act of 1866 and the 14th and 15th Amendments but the gains these provided were soon eroded. The aim
of allowing all freedmen the right to vote was never fully realised. There were a number of reasons for
this: the lack of Presidential commitment to equality for African Americans; the avoidance of the imple-
mentation of the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution; the way the Supreme Court upheld
states’ rights over those of the federal government; the development of sharecropping; and the violence and
intimidation suffered by many African Americans at the hands of white racists, such as the Ku Klux Klan;
these all contributed to the fact that African Americans did not made the social, economic and political
gains Reconstruction could have provided.
In conclusion, the aims of Reconstruction depended upon individual circumstances: Radical
Republicans wanted to punish the South and ensure that African Americans were given the right to vote
and hold office; more moderate Republicans, including President Johnson, wanted to preserve the Union
by giving African Americans some rights and by pardoning civil and military leaders from the South who
appeared to be loyal to the United States; former slaves wanted to preserve their freedom and gain their
civil rights, such as education for their children; and the Southern elite wanted to maintain their position
of power.
How far these aims were achieved depended upon the expectations of the individuals involved.
However, the high ideals of the Radical Republicans and the hopes of many African Americans were
not fully realised in their lifetime. It would take a further hundred years of struggle before this was
the case.
PRACTICE QUESTION
2 How much progress did African Americans make between 1865 and 1890? (20)
(AQA)
In order to assess the progress of blacks over the period 1865–90, it makes sense to break down the
25-year period into two sections in order to increase the scope for analysis. During Reconstruction up to
1877 the position of blacks changed in many ways, often for the better, but the following 13 years or so
saw a gradual reduction in many of the gains made. In order to answer the question effectively, political
(e.g. voting, office-holding), economic (e.g. land-owning, wages, types of jobs), social (e.g. education, family,
churches, segregation) and legal factors (e.g. rights to marry, give evidence in court, serve on juries) should
be taken into consideration, with evidence and statistics to back up points made.
ESSAYS • 261
1111
2111 African Americans and Native Americans
3
4111 3 To what extent did the African American struggle for civil rights influence the campaign for
5 civil rights for Native Americans? (60)
6 (OCR)
7
During the first half of the twentieth century, Native Americans were among the poorest and most neglected
8 of all the people who lived in the United States. They had been deprived of vast areas of their lands and
9 offered financial inducements to move into urban areas. Many white Americans regarded them as worth-
10111 less and treated their culture with contempt, some attempted to educate them by sending their children
1 away to boarding schools, and others attempted to convert them to Christianity. All these actions
2 contributed to the destruction of their tribal bonds and led to many Native Americans enduring discrim-
3 ination and racial abuse while also living in appalling urban conditions.
4 It was this situation that led to many of them joining the civil rights movement, and demanding
5 compensation for the loss of their reservation land and also, among other things, demanding the right to
6 be known as Native Americans. Their struggle can be seen as one that was both linked to and influenced
7 by the African American campaign for civil rights.
8 The Dawes Act of 1887 had given Native Americans some rights of citizenship, including the protec-
9 tion of the law and the requirement to pay taxes. As a reward for their efforts during the First World War,
20111 their rights as citizens had been guaranteed in 1924. In addition to this, Hoover increased federal spending
1 on Native Americans during the Depression and Roosevelt later looked to help them as part of the New
2 Deal. In 1934 the Indian Reorganization Act was passed: it recognised and preserved traditional Native
3 American culture and the right of the Native Americans to control their reservations. Loans were provided
4 to encourage Native Americans to develop businesses and also to increase their educational opportunities.
5 However, few prospered as independent farmers and even fewer were integrated into the mainstream of
6 American society. Alcoholism and illiteracy were rife and many white Americans had a negative image
7 based upon the ‘cowboy and Indian’ stereotype. Comparisons can be drawn with the situation that many
8 African Americans found themselves in at this time. However, neither group had an organised campaign
9 for civil rights until the Second World War.
30 Native Americans did have their own racial consciousness, and this can been seen by the Iroquois tribe
1 independently declaring war on the Germans in 1942, but the campaigning of African Americans during
2 the Second World War certainly influenced the actions of Native Americans. In 1944, Native Americans
3 formed the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI). It intended to launch a series of legal cases to
4 establish rights such as equal education opportunities. Its style of campaigning was obviously influenced
5 by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). This organisation had shown
6 that Roosevelt would respond with positive action when he was put under pressure by organised groups
7 such as this. The first real link between the campaigns of the Native Americans and African Americans for
8 civil rights had now been made. During the 1950s and the 1960s the NCAI remained the main lobbying
9 group for Native Americans. It recruited members from all tribes, in a similar way to how the NAACP had
40 members from the North and South and from urban and rural areas; and women were well represented
1 in both organisations. Many of its demands were peculiar to the needs of Native Americans but compar-
2 isons can be drawn with African American organisations as both groups concerned themselves with issues
3 such as voter registration and better health and educational services.
4 The NCAI had made only limited progress with its campaigns concerning reservation issues, fishing
45 rights and education by the mid-1960s, and some younger Native Americans became very critical of the
46 organisation. Their criticisms were very similar to those of the younger African Americans who were im-
47 patient with the NAACP, and, in a move very reminiscent of the establishment of the Student Non-violent
48 Co-ordinating Committee (SNCC), they established the National Indian Youth Council. The parallels
49222 between the two movements were now becoming more apparent.
262 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
In 1968, the Native Americans’ equivalent of a sit-in, a fish-in, took place; and land was also recov-
ered by legal action in New York and Massachusetts. However, many younger Native Americans were now
moving to live in towns where, in common with African Americans, they continued to face poverty and
discrimination. Disease, alcoholism and illiteracy were still all major problems and life expectancy, at 44
years, was 20 years lower than the US average. Suicide rates among the young were also well above the
national average, and poor housing, unemployment and low pay all contributed to 300 Native Americans
joining the Poor People’s Campaign in 1968.
Black Power influences also became apparent by 1968. The establishment of the American Indian
Movement (AIM) with its more militant ‘Red Power’ approach to their situation reflected this. The rejec-
tion of racial integration by Black Power was similar to Native American feelings about maintaining their
distinctive lifestyle and a similar attitude towards the words ‘Negro’ and ‘Indian,’ which referred to the
slave and colonial past were also apparent. At this time the terms African American and Native American
began to be used.
However, many Native Americans, in common with some African Americans, disliked the new mili-
tancy, and divisions began to appear in their movement. Difficulties remained for both groups, although
sympathetic legislation was passed throughout the 1970s. There was still little change in the traditional
elite and it was still mainly white men with money who held power. At times when the US economy hit
difficulties, it was still the minority groups, such as the African Americans and Native Americans, who
suffered the most. Both groups had made gains but both African Americans and Native Americans
still suffered hardship.
In conclusion, the African American struggle for civil rights certainly influenced the campaign for civil
rights for Native Americans. However, the similarities in their movements owed more to the similarities
of their situations than to one group leading the other in a certain way: both groups had to use whatever
means were available to them in order to improve their situation. The ways in which they developed reflected
the society in which they had to operate.
Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois

4 (a) Was Booker T. Washington’s approach to civil rights ultimately more successful than
that of William Du Bois? (30)
(b) How far did the methods advocated by Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois
regarding African American civil rights differ? (60)
(OCR)
(a) Washington’s approach of ‘accommodationism’ is regarded by some historians as a success. He created

Tuskegee Institute, founded the National Negro Business League, impressed many whites with his achieve-
ments and moderation, and won important recognition, if inconsistent support, from Presidents and
other politicians. In addition to this, he had increased African American self-confidence by demonstrating
that a former slave could become an internationally respected figure. He promoted black and white coop-
eration, yet campaigned secretly against segregation and disenfranchisement. Those who regard his approach
as a success feel that he could have done little more at the time – the late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries – in the struggle for civil rights.
Du Bois’ approach of vociferous campaigning has also been thought of as successful. He was promi-
nent in establishing probably the most important African American organisation, the National Association
for the Advancement of Colored people. He edited The Crisis which was read by thousands of Americans,
both black and white, and he influenced the Harlem Renaissance. He never compromised by working too
closely with white people and his actions and his philosophy certainly influenced the civil rights movement
of the 1960s.
ESSAYS • 263
1111 It can be agreed then that both men were successful, but it is usually Washington who is regarded as
2111 the more influential. This is because his approach was regarded as having more chance of consolidating
3 African American gains in the United States. Du Bois’ frequent changes of mind, his intellectual elitism,
4111 his associations with communism and his often unrealistic and uncompromising approach have led to his
5 contribution being undervalued.
6 During the period 1900–15, however, when both Washington and Du Bois were active, the political
7 will to address the issue of civil rights did not exist. The ‘Black Codes’ were still operational in the South
8 and many Northern African Americans lived in poverty. Consequently, it could be argued that neither
9 Washington nor Du Bois were ultimately successful.
10111
1 (b) Both Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois wanted equality for African Americans. They had
2 worked together for the repeal of railroad segregation laws in Tennessee and for a New York Conference
3 to discuss voting rights, but, as a result of their very different backgrounds, they advocated very different
4 methods in order to achieve their aim.
5 Washington was a former slave who was put in charge of the Tuskegee Negro Normal Institute in
6 Alabama in 1888. This school provided academic education but it concentrated most of its efforts on
7 providing young African American boys with practical skills in areas such as farming and carpentry. It
8 gained a national reputation and attracted the support of a number of white benefactors. He also founded
9 the National Negro Business League to help support the setting up and running of African American busi-
20111 nesses: it would appear that he was more interested in helping African Americans to show that they were
1
responsible and reliable rather than achieving their political rights.
2
White politicians and businessmen approved of Washington’s views. By developing practical skills and
3
encouraging African Americans to gain respect, he seemed to be accepting segregation and the notion that
4
black people were an inferior race who had no political role in the US.
5
His views were not this simplistic, but he certainly prepared to reassure and conciliate whites while
6
quietly campaigning against segregation and discrimination through the law courts. He was a pragmatist
7
who had to coexist with whites. He believed that African Americans would be given equality if they were
8
peaceful, reasonable and made it apparent that they meant white people no harm. He wanted African
9
Americans to concentrate on improving their economic position and appeared to favour ‘separate but
30
1 equal’. Washington was highly regarded by Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Taft but he was
2 unable to use his influence to stop lynching or enable African Americans to exercise their right to vote.
3 To his critics he was regarded as ‘the greatest white man’s nigger in the world’, someone who was more
4 interested in attracting money to his educational establishment rather than advancing the course of civil
5 rights. He was dismissed as an ‘Uncle Tom’ who achieved very little.
6 Du Bois was probably Washington’s most influential critic. He had been born a free man in the North,
7 gained degrees from Harvard and Berlin and became a Professor of Sociology at Atlanta University. His
8 elitist Northern African American background was very different to Washington’s upbringing and helped
9 to explain the differences in their methods.
40 Although he won the support of many liberal white people, Du Bois’ approach was far more aggres-
1 sive than Washington’s. He demanded full civil rights, an end to segregation, the extension of the franchise
2 and equality of opportunity in all aspects of life. He set up the Niagra Movement, which campaigned to
3 gain the rights and freedoms white Americans enjoyed for all African Americans. He later joined the
4 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and edited its magazine, The Crisis. He used
45 this to campaign against lynching, ‘Jim Crow’ laws and sexual inequality. The magazine had a wide read-
46 ership and helped in the campaigns against the racist film Birth of a Nation, and ‘Grandfather’ clauses that
47 were used to disenfranchise African Americans in the South. He asserted that blacks were a chosen people
48 with special cultural and spiritual strengths and he can be regarded as an inspiration to both the civil rights
49222 and Black Power movements of the 1960s.
264 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
It can be seen, then, that the methods employed by Washington and Du Bois were different. However,
both were a response to the situations in which they found themselves. Washington’s methods of ‘accom-
modationism’ was the result of the fact that he was a former slave from the South, whereas Du Bois’ more
radical approach was the direct consequence of his background. As a well-educated freeborn African
American from the North his preconceptions were very different to those of Washington.
Civil rights in the 1950s and 1960s
5 (a) What methods did Martin Luther King use in his civil rights campaigning? (15)
(b) How important was Martin Luther King in securing civil rights for African Americans in
the period 1956–68? (15)
(Edexcel)
(a) After the Montgomery Bus Boycott had brought him to national prominence, King realised that he
would need the help of experienced campaigners if full civil rights were to be achieved. So, with Bayard
Rustin, who was black, and Stanley Levison, who was white, he set up the Southern Christian Leadership
Conference (SCLC). It was a direct campaigning organisation, but as a result of their communist sympa-
thies Rustin and Levison were unable to play a leading public part in its activities. Consequently, King was
portrayed as the major player in its achievements.
King and the SCLC did not initiate the sit-ins and freedom rides of 1960–1. However, King was asked
to address gatherings of students and he used the changing situation to develop the civil rights movement.
King maintained non-violent protest as the mood of the country became more sympathetic to his aims,
and this allowed him to keep the moral high ground and force a response from federal government in
order to achieve a Civil Rights Act. Consequently, his actions were designed to achieve this aim and this
led to criticism from others within the African American community.
One prominent critic was Malcolm X. He saw the white supporters of King’s movement as hypocrites
and the black leaders as deceived men. He was extremely critical of Martin Luther King and rejected the
idea of integration. His ideas appealed to those who regarded King as a member of the African American
elite and Malcolm X served as an inspiration to the Black Power movement, especially in the North. Many
of those who accepted his views certainly had little regard for the influence of Martin Luther King.
(b) Martin Luther King is a controversial figure. His contemporaries and historians hold very different
opinions about his importance to the civil rights movement. To some he was a communist who initiated
violence and disorder in American cities, yet to others he was merely an ‘Uncle Tom’. Many admired him
and felt that he was the most important figure in the civil rights movement. Others, such as Claybourne
Carson, felt that the African American struggle would have developed in a similar way whether or not he
had been a part of it. However, it is clear that his contribution to the civil rights movement cannot
be ignored. From 1957–64, King had no major rival for overall leadership of the civil rights movement. He
was a great orator who could communicate effectively with Southern blacks, Northern whites or the federal
government when required to do so. He helped to keep civil rights on the political agenda and gave the
movement status and respectability. In 1966 King attempted to enhance his reputation in the Northern
ghettos by campaigning against poor housing and lack of employment opportunities in Chicago. However,
his position was weakened as he appeared to be outmanoeuvred by Mayor Daley. This was compounded
as white racists attacked African American demonstrators in larger numbers than had previously attacked
black campaigners in the South. Additionally, King’s lack of experience of African American life in the
North was glaringly obvious. His reputation was further damaged when he denounced the Vietnam War
in January 1967. He had now lost the support of many African Americans in the North, those who supported
ESSAYS • 265
1111 the ideals of Black Power, some moderate whites, the federal government and those who argued that
2111 only by working closely with the President and Congress would their aims be achieved. King was no longer
3 the leader of a united movement.
4111 However, it could be argued that he never had been. The civil rights movement had always had many
5 factions and often King could be said to be one of those being led rather than the leader. Nonetheless, the
6 results were frequently satisfactory to him. His involvement gained national and international attention
7 and sometimes led to reform. At other times, though, his aims and methods were neither successful nor
8 admirable. His patience was criticised by people such as Stokely Carmichael, and he managed to do too
9 little in the view of ‘Black Power’ activists while many whites thought he was doing too much. He was a
10111 moderate leader with limited organisational skills, but he had a great ability to inspire others, and it can
1 be argued that he made a significant contribution to the civil rights movement.
2 By the time of his death much had been achieved: segregation had been destroyed, African Americans
3 were politically active and there was a greater self-confidence among black people in America. King’s ability
4 to inspire, his oratory skills and the media focus he brought to the movement all contributed to this.
5 However, there were others who played important roles too.
6 There would have been no civil rights legislation without the political will to support it and the actions of
7 Johnson’s and Kennedy’s governments were vitally important to the success of the movement. In addition
8 to this, the actions of white extremists hardened public opinion against their stance and increased support for
9 the civil rights movement. The actions of white extremists were reported in the media, which also played an
20111 important part in the success of the movement, hardening public opinion and increasing support. Television
1 and newspapers showed the violence and racism of Southern whites and contrasted it with the peaceful
2 protests of the African Americans. Audiences and readers were able to draw their own conclusions.
3 Many African Americans apart from King also played their part. Thousands of people educated others,
4 protested and inspired. Organisations such as NAACP, CORE, SNCC and local churches all contributed to
5 the struggle. Many famous, and not so famous, people helped to secure civil rights for African Americans
6 in this period. Without their contribution, King would not have been able to achieve anything.
7 In conclusion, Martin Luther King was important in securing civil rights for African Americans in the
8 period 1956–68 but he was fundamentally a figurehead. His actions were important as they brought media
9 attention, government intervention, support from liberal whites, and direction to the actions of many
30 African Americans, but without the contribution of a number of people and organisations African
1 Americans would not have achieved their civil rights at this time. The movement rather than the individual
2 was the most important factor.
3
4
5 PRACTICE QUESTION
6 6 (a) Assess the significance of the Montgomery Bus Boycott in the campaign for civil
7 rights. (30)
8
9 (b) How important was the assassination of John F. Kennedy in securing civil rights for
40 African Americans? (60)
1 (OCR)
2
3 Advice: Both parts of this question expect you to assess the importance of two key events during the campaign
4 for civil rights. For Part (a), you will need to assess the importance of the Montgomery Bus Boycott from both
45 strategic and psychological perspectives, in addition to measuring it against other events. For Part (b), you will
46 also need to assess the significance of John F. Kennedy’s assassination when compared with other events. For
47 this question, it is important to consider the impact of the legislation that was passed in the wave of sympathy
48 that accompanied Kennedy’s death and how far changes to the law actually affected the lives of African
49222 Americans.
266 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
Part 3: Sources
1 Responses to Plessy v. Ferguson
■ Source A: Michigan Law Journal (1896)
In the Supreme Court of the United States was decided lately the case of Plessy v. Ferguson. In this case
the question at issue was whether or not an act was constitutional which directed separate coaches and
accommodations to be provided on railway trains for white people and colored people and which made a
passenger liable to fine or imprisonment who insisted on occupying a coach or compartment other than
the one set apart for his race. The act has been held constitutional and not contrary to the Constitution
Amendment 14. The opinion is by Justice Brown and a distinction is made between laws interfering with
the political equality of the two races and those requiring their separation in schools, theatres, etc. The
opinion shows that acts under the second class have been in many cases held constitutional.
■ Source B: Booker T. Washington: ‘Who is Permanently Hurt?’ (June 1896)
The United States Supreme Court has recently handed down a decision declaring the separate coach law,
or ‘Jim Crow’ car law constitutional. What does this mean? Simply that the separation of colored and white
passengers as now practiced in certain Southern States, is lawful and constitutional. This separation may
be good law, but it is not good common sense. The difference in the color of the skin is a matter for which
nature is responsible. If the Supreme Court can say that it is lawful to compel all persons with black skins
to ride in one car and all with white skins to ride in another, why may it not say that it is lawful to put all
yellow people in one car and all white people, whose skin is sun burnt, in another car. Nature has given
both their color; or why cannot the courts go further and decide that all men with bald heads must ride
in one car and all with red hair still in another. Nature is responsible for all these conditions.
But the colored people do not complain so much of the separation, as of the fact that the accommoda-
tions, with almost no exceptions, are not equal, still the same price is charged the colored passengers as is
charged the white people.
Now the point of all this article is not to make a complaint against the white man or the ‘Jim Crow Car’
law, but it is simply to say that such an unjust law inures the white man, and inconveniences the Negro.
No race can wrong another race simply because it has the power to do so, without being permanently
injured in morals, and its ideas of justice. The Negro can endure the temporary inconvenience, but the
injury to the white man is permanent. It is the one who inflicts the wrong that is hurt, rather than the one
on whom the wrong is inflicted. It is for the white man to save himself from this degradation that I plead.
If a white man steals a Negro’s ballot, it is the white man who is permanently injured. Physical death comes
to the Negro lynched – death of the morals – death of the soul – comes to the white man who perpetrates
the lynching.
■ Source C: Extract from the New York Evening Journal (May 1896)
In justification of this law it is urged that while many colored people are less objectionable than many of
the white race to first-class passengers, the majority of them are not only objectionable, but their presence
in the same cars with the whites is a source of constant disorder. Hence it is simply a police regulation
SOURCES • 267
1111 which any State has a perfect right to sanction. Of course, this decision does not interfere with the colored
2111 passengers’ right to demand safe and comfortable accommodations, nor prevent them from suing for
3 damages in the event of injury of person or loss of property.
4111
5
■ Source D: Extract from Charles W. Chesnutt’s speech c.1911
6
7
But to my mind the most important and far reaching decision of the Supreme Court upon the question
8
of civil rights is that in the case of Plessy vs. Ferguson, a case which came up from Louisiana in 1895. The
9
opinion is a clear and definite approval of the recognition by State laws, of color distinctions, something
10111
which had theretofore been avoided in civil rights cases. It establishes racial caste in the United States as
1
firmly as though it were established by act of Congress. The Court cited the passage quoted by me from a
2
former decision:
3
4 ‘The Fourteenth Amendment was ordained to secure equal rights to all persons, and extends its protection
5 to races and classes, and prohibits any State legislation which has the effect of denying to any race or class,
6 or to any individual, the equal protection of the laws, and made the rights of the two races exactly the same.’
7
8 And then the Court stabbed in the back, and to death, this ideal presentment of rights and threw its bleeding
9 corpse to the Negro.
20111
1
AQA QUESTION FORMAT
2
3 The questions and answers that follow are based on the revised AQA style.
4
5 (a) Study Sources A and C and use your own knowledge. Account for the differences in the
6 way in which the Plessy v. Ferguson decision was reported in the Michigan Law Journal
7 and the New York Evening Journal. (10)
8
(b) Study Sources A, B, C and D and use your own knowledge. How significant was the Plessy
9
v. Ferguson decision for African Americans? (20)
30
1
2 (a) The Michigan Law Journal reports the Plessy v. Ferguson decision in a concise factual manner. It refers
3 to the fact that both black and white people could be punished for ‘occupying a coach or compartment
4 other than the one set apart for his race’ and it makes it clear that Justice Brown made a distinction between
5 laws that prevented political equality and those that established segregation in public places. The Michigan
6 Law Journal reports that an Act which directed separate coaches on railway trains was constitutional
7 and that it did not contravene the 14th Amendment. The report does not pass any judgement on the
8 decision.
9 The New York Evening Journal explains that the Plessy v. Ferguson decision was made because African
40 American passengers were both objectionable to first-class passengers and that their presence would be
1 ‘a source of constant disorder’. This justification of the decision assumes that all first-class passengers
2 were white and it implies that any disorder that resulted from allowing black and white passengers to travel
3 together would be the fault of the African Americans. It reports that the judgement was ‘simply a police
4 regulation’ which suggests that it was a perfectly logical decision. The journalist adds that any state had
45 ‘a perfect right to sanction’ it. This is clearly an attempt to justify the decision as one that upheld the
46 natural right of individual states of the Union to make judgements on matters such as this. The extract
47 also upholds the ‘separate but equal’ notion by stating that the decision did not interfere with the rights
48 of African Americans who chose to travel on the railway. The article is obviously an attempt to justify
49222 the decision.
268 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
The differences between the two articles stem from the fact that they were intended for different
audiences. The readers of the Michigan Law Journal would have been educated people with an interest in
law and who would have been expected to form their own opinions about the decision. The New York
Evening Journal would have had a wider readership but they would still have been essentially white.
Many of them would have been recent immigrants from Europe who would have seen African Ameri-
cans as a threat to employment opportunities. The article would have been intended to appeal to their
prejudices.
(b) On 18 May 1896 the United States Supreme Court ruled that a Louisiana law mandating ‘separate but
equal’ accommodations for ‘whites’ and ‘coloreds’ on interstate railroads did not violate the constitutional
rights of Homer Plessy, who, with one-eighth African blood, was a ‘colored’ person under state law. The
Court’s decision permitted a legal system of racial segregation in the US until the ruling of Brown v. Board
of Education almost 60 years later.
The Plessy v. Ferguson decision is often regarded as the beginning of ‘Jim Crow’ but it came about
because Plessy was continuing an existing struggle against segregation. Similar actions had preceded this
protest and many more followed. Consequently, it should be seen as part of an existing struggle against
‘separate but equal’ that continued into the twentieth century. It should also be noted that the 1875
Civil Rights Act, which banned racial discrimination in public places and civil areas such as jury service,
had effectively been nullified in 1883 by the Supreme Court on the grounds that it went further than the
14th Amendment (which aimed at stopping discrimination by states and not by individuals or private
companies). In other words ‘separate but equal’ was already a fact of life by 1896, and ‘Plessy’ can simply
be said to have reinforced the existing situation. However, Waldo Martin Jr has pointed out that ‘Plessy’
‘legitimized the culture of Jim Crow’, and ‘was the most widely cited precedent for the legality of
Jim Crow’ until it was overturned in 1954. The fact that the Court determined ‘separate but equal’ to be
‘held constitutional’ (Source A) therefore can be said to have influenced the lives of African Americans
for over half a century.
Booker T. Washington in Source B acknowledges that ‘the separation of . . . passengers as . . . prac-
ticed in certain Southern states’ was lawful and constitutional. In other words it did not actually change
anything in practice, although he anticipates that ‘separate but equal’ would in effect mean ‘separate but
unequal’. He argues that whites perpetrating such injustice would ultimately be the ones who were ‘perma-
nently injured’. The next 50 years would suggest that his assessment was overly optimistic, but this moral
argument against Plessy would form part of the basis for the civil rights movement in the latter part of the
twentieth century. The New York Evening Journal in Source C naively implies that ‘separate but equal’ will
not affect the facilities blacks will have by suggesting that it did not ‘interefere with the colored passengers’
right to demand safe and comfortable accommodations’. These arguments were used for almost a hundred
years so both Sources highlight the long-term impact of the decision.
Finally, in Source D, Chesnutt confirms that it was the first time that the Jim Crow laws had been
recognised and legitimised by this branch of the federal government. He feels Plessy undermined completely
the 14th Amendment, saying the idea of equality had been ‘stabbed in the back, and to death’ and left to
the Negro to deal with. He clearly believes that ‘Plessy v. Ferguson’ was ‘the most important and far-reaching
decision of the Supreme Court upon the question of civil rights’. To him it was this decision that firmly
established the ‘racial caste’ that African Americans would have to fight to overcome throughout the
twentieth century.
Plessy v. Ferguson was certainly a very important decision in the struggle for civil rights, and shaped
that struggle for the next 50 years or so. It also played a part in the formation of the NAACP in 1909.
SOURCES • 269
1111 ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE AQA STYLE

2111
3 (a) Study Source C and use your own knowledge. How useful is Source C in showing the
4111 ‘white reaction’ to Plessy? (10)
5
(b) Study all the Sources and use your own knowledge. Account for the different reactions
6
to Plessy v. Ferguson. (20)
7
8
9
10111 2 Responses to Brown v. Board of Education
1
■ Source A: Post and Times Herald (Washington DC), ‘Emancipation’ (18 May 1954)
2
3
4 The Supreme Court’s resolution yesterday of the school segregation cases affords all Americans an occa-
5 sion for pride and gratification. The decision will prove, we are sure – whatever transient difficulties it may
6 create and whatever irritations it may arouse – a profoundly healthy and healing one. It will serve – and
7 speedily – to close an ancient wound too long allowed to fester. It will bring to an end a painful disparity
8 between American principles and American practices. It will help to refurbish American prestige in a world
9 which looks to this land for moral inspiration and restore the faith of Americans themselves in their own
20111 great values and traditions.
1
2 ■ Source B: Daily News (Jackson, Mississippi), ‘Bloodstains on White Marble Steps’
3 (18 May 1954)
4
5 . . . Human blood may stain Southern soil in many places because of this decision but the dark red stains
6 of that blood will be on the marble steps of the United States Supreme Court building.
7
8 White and Negro children in the same schools will lead to miscegenation. Miscegenation leads to mixed
9 marriages and mixed marriages lead to mongrelization of the human race.
30
1 ■ Source C: Herald (Boston), ‘Equality Redefined’ (18 May 1954)
2
3 The Supreme Court’s history-making decision against racial segregation in the public schools proves more
4 than anything else that the Constitution is still a live and growing document.
5
6 . . . The segregation ruling is frankly expedient. It recognizes the growing national feeling that the separa-
7 tion of Negro (or other minority) children from the majority race at school age is an abuse of the democratic
8 process and the democratic principle. But it is also the culmination of a series of judicial opinions which
9 circumspectly prepared the way for change.
40
1 ■ Source D: Times (Los Angeles), ‘The Segregation Decision’ (19 May 1954)
2
3 . . . We may be sure that the present decision on segregation is not going to lead to civil war, but we may
4 be almost as certain that it will provoke a social and political revolution. Yet it is hard at this point to see
45 how the court could have come to any other conclusion.
46
47 Enforcement of the decision looms as a tremendous problem for the court. Apparently it will require pres-
48 sure on, or coercion of, virtually the whole white populations of the States where segregation has been law
49222 and custom.
270 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
. . . The confusion of change in some areas could work to the disadvantage of at least one school genera-
tion, Negro and white, unless mutual restraint and understanding are joined in resolving the issue.
AQA QUESTION FORMAT
(a) Study Sources B and C and use your own knowledge. Account for the differences in the
way in which the Brown v. Board of Education decision was reported in the Daily News
and the Boston Herald? (10)
(b) Study all the Sources and use your own knowledge. How significant was the Brown v.
Board of Education decision for African Americans? (20)
(a) The Daily News is a Mississippi newspaper. In other words, it might be expected to reflect the predom-
inant views held by people in the ‘Deep South’ where segregation was a way of life. The apocalyptic terms
used in the article such as ‘human blood may stain Southern soil . . . because of this decision’ reflect deep
opposition to the Brown decision, in suggesting that violence may result. The fear of white and black mixing
together is also overtly reflected in such racist comments as ‘mixed marriages lead to mongrelization of the
human race’. The Boston Herald appears to be more supportive of the Brown decision and as it is a New
England newspaper this is not in itself surprising, but in actual fact the wording of the article tends to focus
more on the ‘growing national feeling’ against segregation and the ruling being ‘expedient’ rather than
actually praising the judgement on its merits. The Source also suggests that the decision was not entirely
unexpected given the context of a ‘culmination of a series of judicial opinions which circumspectly prepared
the way for change’.
(b) The most important short-term consequence of Brown was probably the momentum it gave to the
civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s and to Black Power. The decision applied specifically to
ending segregation in education but it implied that segregation in any form was illegal. Within a year
of Brown more than 500 school districts in the North and Upper South desegregated. Conservatives
tended to see Brown as a restriction of states’ rights by the federal government, while ‘blacks and their
progressive allies’, according to Martin have seen the decision as a ‘necessary step towards squaring
America’s treatment of blacks within the American creed: a simple matter of justice and morality’. Brown
struck a great blow for equality, despite Eisenhower’s opposition to it, and his reluctance to use federal
power to enforce desegregation until Little Rock. The Brown judgement failed to set target dates for the
implementation of desegregation, and even Brown II set no dates, which in part encouraged the setting
up of White Citizens Councils particularly in the Deep South to oppose desegregation. So although
Brown ended school segregation in theory, in practice it was less effective, particularly in certain parts
of the country. The Los Angeles Times in Source D may have been slightly premature in hailing ‘a social
and political revolution’ but does anticipate the problems of coercing ‘virtually the whole white popula-
tions’ of Southern states. The Washington Post (Source A) takes a very positive approach regarding the
judgement in describing it as ‘an occasion for pride and gratification’ and essentially sums up the views
of black Americans. It is perhaps overly optimistic in its discussion of only ‘transient difficulties’ on the
road to healing wounds, particularly given that separate white and black colleges and universities still
exist in Southern states today. The Daily News’ vision of ‘blood . . . on the marble steps’ (Source B) in a
sense anticipated the violence to come, exaggerated the impact desegregation would have in practice, but
in many ways reflected the views of those such as Herman Talmadge, the governor of Georgia, who said
that his state would ‘not tolerate the mixing of the races in the public schools’, and effectively encouraged
the terror campaigns of the Ku Klux Klan. The Boston Herald (Source C) sees the decision as bolstering
SOURCES • 271
1111 ‘the democratic process . . . and principle’. At elementary and secondary schools, desegregation in the South
2111 appears to have worked relatively well. In 1964, 98 per cent of blacks in the South were still attending segre-
3 gated schools, but by 1997 only 33 per cent were. Ironically by the 1990s, most racially segregated schools
4111 appeared to be in the North and West. The Brown ruling gave great heart to the civil rights movement,
5 and, in the short term, forced the federal government to take action to enforce desegregation, but in prac-
6 tice has perhaps proved to be less important in terms of school segregation, than it has as a symbol of
7 justice and equality for blacks.
8
9
10111
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE AQA STYLE
1
2
(a) Use Source B and your own knowledge. How useful is Source B as a reflection of white
3
4 opinion towards Brown? (10)
5 (b) Use all the Sources and your own knowledge. Account for the different reactions to the
6 Brown decision. (20)
7
8
9
1
2
1 Role play: a television debate on whether to make Martin Luther
3
King’s birthday a national holiday in the US
4
5
The aims of this activity are to allow you to develop your research, listening and public speaking skills. You
6
will also be given the opportunity to assess the wide-ranging opinions on the importance of Martin Luther
7
8 King.
9 The year is 1981. Stevie Wonder has just had a hit single with ‘Happy Birthday’ a song requesting that
30 King’s birthday becomes a national holiday and there has been a great deal of coverage about this issue in
1 the media. Each of you should represent one of the characters from the list below. How you decide who
2 is allocated which character is up to you. You should think about your character’s opinion of King and
3 what you think about the advantages and disadvantages of making his birthday a national holiday. You
4 should prepare a brief talk which expresses your views and deals with any points you think might be raised
5 by people with different ideas to your own. After each of you has had your say, there should be time for
6 a general discussion. You should also be prepared to take questions from people who have observed your
7 discussion.
8
9 The people who should be represented at your debate are:
40
1 1 a white Southern Democratic congressman who was elected as a result of the African American vote;
2 2 a former NAACP activist who had been on the March on Washington;
3 3 a Republican congressman who is not reliant on the African American vote;
4 4 a poor African American agricultural labourer from South Carolina;
45 5 a young African American male from the west coast;
46 6 a poor white female from Georgia;
47 7 a well educated secret member of the Ku Klux Klan;
48 8 an African American Muslim;
49222 9 a white Protestant clergyman from Boston;
272 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001
10 an African American television executive from New York;

11 a white ‘liberal’;
12 a Native American who had been part of the ‘Red Power’ movement.
After the debate write a report in which you summarise the arguments and highlight the conclusions
reached.
2 Using numbers: analysis of the average income of persons with

earned income, by race and sex
It is always useful to be able to use numbers and statistics and to show that you understand the different
ways in which numerical information can be deployed.
Use the figures opposite to complete the following tasks.
1 What is the average wage for each group in the period 1967–91?
2 What does this lead you to believe?
3 Construct a graph to show all the information contained in the table.
4 What conclusions can you draw from you graph?
5 How useful are these figures in assessing the impact of the civil rights movement on the lives of African
Americans in the US?
3 Mind maps
Many students find the construction of mind maps a helpful way to revise and to plan essay answers.
Choose any person whom you have read about in this chapter and write their name in the middle of a
sheet of paper. Then add, leading into their name, any events or people who influenced them. Then add,
leading from their name, any events or people that they influenced. Look for connections between all the
people and events that you write down.
4 Hot seating: assuming a role and answering questions
Each student is given or selects the name of one person covered in this chapter. The student then carries
out extra research on their chosen person. The others in the group plan questions to ask the student in the
‘hot seat’ once they have completed their research. When they are ready they sit at the front of the class
and assume the persona of the person they have researched. The others in the group then ask them ques-
tions in the style of a formal question-and-answer session. The person in the ‘hot seat’ should remain in
character throughout the activity.
Alternatively, each student could assume the role of an expert on a particular topic, issue or period
studied in this chapter. They should carry out extra research on their chosen area and the others in the
group should ask them questions when they are in the ‘hot seat’.
This is a particularly useful exercise for deepening knowledge and understanding of a particular person,
topic, issue or period.
1111
Average income of persons with earned income, by race and sex (1991)
2111
3 Male Female
4111
5 Black ($) White ($) B/W (%) Black ($) White ($) B/W (%)
6
1991 12,962 21,395 60.6 8,816 10,721 82.2
7
8 1990 13,409 22,061 60.8 8,678 10,751 80.7
9
10111 1989 13,850 22,916 60.4 8,650 10,777 80.3
1
1988 13,866 22,979 60.3 8,461 10,480 80.7
2
3 1987 13,449 22,666 59.3 8,331 10,199 81.7
4
5 1986 13,630 22,443 59.9 8,160 9,643 84.6
6
1985 13,630 21,659 62.9 7,945 9,312 85.3
7
8 1984 12,385 21,586 57.4 8,080 9,109 88.7
9
20111 1983 12,335 21,092 58.5 7,615 8,912 85.4
1
1982 12,591 21,011 59.9 7,498 8,501 88.2
2
3 1981 12,851 21,611 59.5 7,412 8,343 88.8
4
5 1980 13,254 22,057 60.1 7,580 8,187 92.6
6
1979 14,019 22,648 61.9 7,358 8,085 91.0
7
8 1978 13,844 23,110 59.9 7,480 8,307 90.0
9
30 1977 13,560 22,850 59.3 7,446 8,622 86.4
1
1976 13,719 22,785 60.2 7,791 8,268 94.2
2
3 1975 13,475 22,538 59.8 7,530 8,288 90.9
4
5 1974 14,397 23,235 62.0 7,385 8,180 90.3
6
1973 14,754 24,392 60.5 7,352 8,146 90.3
7
8 1972 14,519 23,970 60.6 7,497 8,025 93.4
9
40 1971 13,639 22,870 59.6 6,778 7,736 87.6
1
1970 13,709 23,121 59.3 6,803 7,473 91.0
2
3 1969 13,603 23,386 58.2 6,361 7,543 84.3
4
45 1968 13,432 22,641 59.3 5,957 7,511 79.3
46
1968 12,554 21,935 57.2 5,478 6,960 78.7
47
48
49222
274 • CIVIL RIGHTS, 1863–2001

Peter Carroll and David Noble, The Free and the Unfree, David Paterson, Susan Willoughby and Doug Willoughby,
Penguin (1989). Civil Rights in the USA 1863–1980, Heinemann (2001).
W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, Bedford Books Vivienne Sanders, Race Relations in the USA since 1900,
(1997). Hodder & Stoughton (2000).
Waldo E. Martin Jr, Brown v. Board of Education, Brook Thomas, Plessy v. Ferguson – A Brief History With
Bedford/St Martin’s (1998). Documents, Bedford Books (1997).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 11
5
6
7
8
9 Domestic Policy from Kennedy
10111
1
2
to Bush, 1961–2001
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111
1 This chapter examines the changing role of the federal government in political, economic
2 and social affairs since 1961.
3
4
5
6 Historical background The causes and consequences of
7 Watergate
8 The Democrats’ ‘New Frontier’ and ‘Great The problems that beset Gerald Ford
9 Society’ Was Jimmy Carter a Presidential failure?
30 The zenith of Presidential imperialism The style and substance of President
1 A resurgent Congress and a humbler Presidency Reagan
2 The triumph of style over substance The domestic failure of George Bush
3 ‘It’s the economy, Stupid’ Trends in the balance of power, 1960–1992
4 The return of the right
5
6 Historical skills
7 Essays
8 1 Extracts from Ronald Reagan’s
9 The aims and impact of the ‘New Frontier’ speeches
40 Explaining the legislative impact of Lyndon 2 Research questions on domestic issues,
1 Johnson 1960–1992
2
3
4
45
46
47
48
49222
276 • DOMESTIC POLICY FROM KENNEDY TO BUSH, 1961–2001
Chronology
1961 January Inauguration of John F. Kennedy

1962 April Battle with US Steel
1963 November Assassination of JFK and swearing in of Lyndon Johnson
1964 Launch of the ‘Great Society’
November Election of President Johnson
1968 Assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy
Nixon victory in Presidential elections
1972 Beginning of the Watergate scandal
1973 Gerald Ford replaced Spiro Agnew as Vice-President
1974 August Resignation of Richard Nixon and accession of Ford
1977 January Jimmy Carter became 39th President
1978 September Camp David peace summit
1979 November Beginning of hostage crisis in Tehran
December Soviet invasion of Afghanistan
1980 April Hostage rescue attempt
June Energy Security Act
1981 January Inauguration of Ronald Reagan
Freeing of American hostages
Economic Recovery Tax Act
Omnibus Budget and Reconstruction Act
1984 Defeat of Walter Mondale
1987 Iran-Contra hearings
1989 George Bush inaugurated
1992 Race riots in Los Angeles
November Bush defeated by Democrat Bill Clinton
1994 Republicans gained control of Congress
1995 Temporary shutdown of federal government
1999 Clinton survived impeachment hearings before the Senate
2000 Controversial election victory of George W. Bush
The Democrats’ ‘New Frontier’ and ‘Great Society’
The Cold War was to dominate US foreign policy from the end of the Second World War until the collapse
of the Soviet Union. During this era the battle between capitalism and communism often overshadowed
and affected events at home. However, domestic history throughout this period is an area rich in issues,
events, ideologies and personalities, an examination of which not only sheds light upon the present-day
United States, but also gives a greater insight into the twentieth century’s great ideological struggle and
America’s ultimate victory.
For America, the 1950s was a time of consumer and cultural confidence, and self-contentment. But
during the latter years of the Eisenhower Presidency, the US experienced a period of introspection
and alarm as a generation of young people registered their discontentment with mainstream culture and
1111 Figure 11.1

2111 John F. Kennedy with Soviet
3 leader Nikita Khrushchev in
4111 Vienna, 1961
5
6
7
8
9
10111
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8 the Soviet Union seemingly moved ahead in areas of technology. This national sense of drift was to define
9 the elections of 1960 when the incumbent Vice-President, Richard Nixon, faced John F. Kennedy in the
20111 battle for the White House.
1 Kennedy was a young senator from Massachusetts who belonged to a wealthy and politically powerful
2 family. He was also a Catholic, an issue that he succinctly neutralised in the Presidential campaign by simply
3 asking whether the fact that he was baptised should automatically exclude him from being given the oppor-
4 tunity to serve as President. Kennedy’s energy and charisma, coupled with the shrewd political awareness
5 of his team and himself, saw him win the nomination of the Democratic Party over a more powerful senator,
6 Lyndon Baines Johnson of Texas. Kennedy strengthened his hand by inviting Johnson to join with him,
7 thus presenting a more appealing ticket of the young, Catholic Northerner combined with a more estab-
8 lished, Protestant Southerner.
9 He focused his campaign on getting the country moving again, calling for a new sense of national
30 purpose to meet the challenges that lay ahead. He claimed America was standing on the edge of a ‘New
1 Frontier’ and presented himself as the person to take the nation forward. By shaping the agenda in such a
2 way, he was able to use his relative youth to his advantage. The difference between the candidates was espe-
3 cially stark during televised debates when a rather gaunt Nixon appeared unfavourably alongside the vigour
4 and charm of the young challenger. It is illustrative of the impact of television upon politics that Nixon
5 was deemed to have won the live debates by radio audiences. In November 1960, Kennedy defeated Nixon
6 by the narrowest of margins, owing his victory to a superbly run campaign and, so some have claimed,
7 electoral manipulation by his father and the Mafia.
8 The new President delivered an eloquent and inspirational inaugural address that signalled the torch
9 had been passed on to a new generation. The speech alluded overwhelmingly to foreign affairs and the
40 Cold War in particular with little attention being devoted to domestic matters. This stood somewhat at
1 odds with his acceptance speech in which he had spoken of the New Frontier, though it is for his role as
2 foreign policy leader that he is best remembered. On social policy, Kennedy showed himself to be sympa-
3 thetic yet cautious on civil rights, but committed to improving education and reducing poverty. Regarding
4 the economy, he actively courted the support of the business community and has been described by econ-
45 omists Seymour Harris and Walter Heller as the first modern economist in the American Presidency.
46 Domestically JFK is commonly judged to have achieved only a rather modest amount of success during his
47 2 years and 10 months in office. As the first President to be born in the twentieth century, Kennedy and
48 his glamorous wife ushered in a new era in Washington that is often referred to as ‘Camelot’. He was
49222 looking ahead to a more productive second term having laid the groundwork in the three years since his
election. Following his assassination in November 1963, it was left to his successor to capitalise on the
genuine wave of sympathy, and attempt to realise the vision that Kennedy had laid out.
Fortunately for America, the man whom Kennedy had asked to be his running mate was considered
to be a capable and suitable replacement. Vice-President Lyndon Baines Johnson was sworn in while aboard
Air Force One as it left Dallas on 22 November 1963. The Texan had entered politics after being inspired
by Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal of the 1930s. He had served in the House of Representatives before
moving to the Senate, where he held the position of Majority Leader throughout the 1950s. In stark contrast
with his predecessor, he had a modest background and a crude, sometimes threatening style as he twisted
arms to get measures through Congress.
His undoubted political skills, coupled with the nation’s grief, enabled Johnson not only to realise
some of JFK’s initiatives, but also to go further and leave his own mark, the ‘Great Society’. The mid-1960s
was a period of intense legislating and investment in social programmes that rivalled, and some would say
surpassed, the New Deal. President Johnson’s first State of the Union address in January 1964 left no one
in any doubt as to what his priorities were when he launched ‘an unconditional war on poverty in America’.
The ensuing Economic Opportunity Act led to the establishment of a range of initiatives, from the launching
of a domestic version of the Peace Corps and work training programmes to giving loans to rural and small
businesses. He then pushed through a more ambitious Civil Rights Bill than the one to which Kennedy
had finally committed himself, before winning the White House in his own right in November 1964.
The elections were a crushing defeat for the Republicans. Arizona senator Barry Goldwater ran a very
conservative campaign, criticising civil rights measures and other liberal legislation as an attack on indi-
vidual rights while suggesting that Johnson was timid in foreign affairs and that the use of nuclear weapons
was not all that bad an idea. Johnson won an impressive 61 per cent of the popular vote and was able to
claim a clear mandate for his own programme, the Great Society.
Johnson’s aim was to give people a ‘hand-up’ (as opposed to ‘hand-out’) in helping themselves out of
poverty. Medical cover for the elderly and low-waged was guaranteed by the state and the introduction of
the Food Stamp programme aimed to reduce malnutrition. Houses were built, cities were remodelled and
local citizens were encouraged to participate in community-based projects. Federal aid was provided to
elementary and secondary schools and pre-school was promoted through the ‘Head Start’ programme.
Economic growth helped fund this massive increase in government spending, but America’s ever
increasing involvement in Vietnam and the economic problems of the late 1960s took their toll on the
Great Society as well as the President himself. Millions had been helped out of poverty but America was
gripped by a sense of disillusionment. Civil rights riots, student protests, anti-war campaigns and a
burgeoning counter-culture provided the backdrop to the latter half of the 1960s. President Johnson looked
on bewildered by what he saw and taken aback by the apparent ingratitude of the people he had served
for so long and so well.
He retreated inside the White House, showed signs of paranoia and even quit drinking, much to the
concern of his aides. But he could not escape as crowds outside the White House constantly chanted: ‘Hey,
hey LBJ. How many kids did you kill today?’. His nerves frayed, particularly by Vietnam, Johnson chose
not to stand for re-election in 1968. His Presidency was bookended by the assassinations of John Kennedy
and Robert Kennedy, the latter being slain during the ensuing Democratic primaries. It was a tragic start
and end to a Presidential career that had accomplished a considerable amount. Scholars have since tended
to concentrate on Johnson’s unique style and on the social tensions that opened up over civil rights and
Vietnam to the detriment of his actual achievements.
The zenith of Presidential imperialism
The elections of 1968 saw the Republicans gain control of the White House. Richard Nixon had been Vice-
President under Eisenhower in the 1950s before withdrawing from political life following defeats in the
1111 Presidential election of 1960 and the 1962 California gubernatorial election. During the mid-1960s Vietnam,
2111 social unrest and economic difficulties had strained the relationship between the people and the Presidency.
3 Trust became an important factor as the people sought a President who would act more in accordance
4111 with their wishes. Nixon represented a link with more peaceful and prosperous times and seemed to be
5 the person most able to capitalise on the Democrats’ problems and the nation’s worries. He narrowly
6 defeated Democrat Hubert Humphrey in a race that saw the right-wing governor of Alabama, George
7 Wallace, carry five states in the Deep South. The year 1968 had been a tortuous one for America and it
8 now looked forward to a period of normalacy.
9 Nixon’s major objectives were to bring ‘peace with honour’ in Vietnam and to reduce the role of the
10111 federal government at home. The economy did not perform well as the war dragged on and the Democratic-
1 controlled Congress continued to spend. The price of oil multiplied due to problems in the Middle East
2 and this had a significant impact domestically. Both unemployment and inflation rose and, furthermore,
3 the US was now running a trade deficit. Nixon was to find more success with social policy. The President’s
4 preference for promoting local solutions to problems bore fruit in education where the swift reduction
5 in segregated schooling was startling. Women’s rights were advanced by the 1972 Equal Rights Amend-
6 ment and the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, which safeguarded the right to a safe and
7 legal abortion.
8 Facing a Democratic Congress that was prepared to override his veto, Nixon became more active on
9 foreign policy. He pursued a policy of gradual withdrawal from Vietnam, which would give South Vietnam
20111 time to learn to rely upon itself. But several high-profile military ventures, such as incursions into Cambodia
1 and Laos and an escalation in the use of air power early in 1972 gave the impression of an expansion of
2 US involvement. To the public this was a clear transgression of campaign pledges and Nixon faced protests
3 similar to those that had plagued his predecessor. In May 1970 campus riots left four dead in Ohio and
4 Nixon showed his insensitivity by later denouncing young radicals as ‘bums’.
5 Nixon was comfortably re-elected in 1972 but was forced to resign midway through his second term
6 because of the Watergate scandal. He had faced George McGovern of the Democrats, who ran a liberal
7 campaign encompassing an anti-war stance that Nixon had found easy to portray as a sign of weakness.
8 But the victory had left behind the seeds of his own destruction, as a group of men, who had been detained
9 while attempting to place surveillance equipment inside the headquarters of the Democratic Party (in the
30 Watergate building in Washington DC), were brought to trial. In the ensuing investigations it became
1 apparent that a trail of dirty tricks led directly to the White House. Nixon resigned on 9 August 1974
2 knowing that he would not survive impeachment hearings. His incumbency had resulted in a considerable
3 easing in Cold War tensions but his greatest legacy was the destruction of the already shaken faith that the
4 American people had in the office of President.
5
6
7 A resurgent Congress and a humbler Presidency
8
9 Nixon’s original Vice-President, Spiro Agnew, had been forced to resign after revelations of tax fraud and
40 the Republican Congressional leader Gerald Ford had taken his place. Now the competent mid-westerner
1 found himself in the White House although he had never stood for national office. His short administration
2 was hindered by his pardoning of Richard Nixon and an eagerly assertive Congress and media. Ford managed
3 to halt the decline of the Presidency in the eyes of the people as he adopted a humbler approach than the
4 apparent imperialism of the Johnson and Nixon years, but he was rejected by the electorate in 1976.
45 Jimmy Carter was to continue the redemption of the White House that Ford had begun. Like his prede-
46 cessor, Carter knew that America was in no mood for a slick politician as President, so he toned down the
47 ceremony of the office and introduced a more frugal administration. The imperial Presidency was dead
48 and finally a line could be drawn under the trauma of the previous ten years. Carter was an uncharismatic
49222 President who eschewed the backslapping and vote trading of Washington DC. The former farmer-turned-
Figure 11.2 Elvis Presley with President governor of Georgia instead brought with him a moral
Richard Nixon, 1971 and ethical style that helped restore the people’s faith
in their leader.
He found success in foreign affairs, continuing
the thaw in the Cold War and brokering peace at
Camp David between the Egyptians and Israelis.
Domestically he is recalled for his mishandling of
Congress because of his reluctance to play the game
in the way Washington was accustomed to. Though
thwarted on tax and welfare reform and seeing his
energy proposals blocked and amended, he neverthe-
less enjoyed a remarkably high and consistent success
rate with a Democratic, though less controllable
Congress.
The economy did not fare particularly well under Carter. The oil crisis of the 1970s fuelled inflation
and interest rates and it transpired that there was little the White House could do to ease the situation. But
Carter managed to reduce the federal budget deficit in the face of Democratic spending expectations and
cut the domestic consumption of oil. Advancing the environment as a political issue and overcoming racial
discrimination appeared almost as dear to him as running a tight ship. But his White House was not
immune to controversy. The Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Bert Lance, was investi-
gated for improper conduct in his previous career and the President’s brother’s business links with the
Libyan government were scrutinised, thus staining the ethical image that the Carter administration strove
to project. Feuds among his staff were not unheard of and he once felt compelled to sack half his cabinet.
Carter can be portrayed as a bungler who reacted to events rather than shaped them. An ongoing
hostage crisis at the American embassy in Iran took its toll and the people rejected him after only one term.
Alternatively, however, it might be said that his Presidency was good for America in the long term, and
that Carter was a victim of his own success. By 1980 Carter’s fireside chats and low-key administration
seemed old and the people grew tired of the humbler Presidency. Their faith in the office largely restored,
they were once more ready to accept a stronger more traditional type of leader to steer them through
domestic and international waters.
The 1970s had not been a successful decade for America. The oil shock, Watergate, the losing of the
Vietnam War, the hostage crisis and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan had all had a detrimental effect on
the American economy, political system and society. The nation had been made to realise that there were
limits to its power internationally and domestically. These limitations were echoed in the Presidency, where
an emboldened Congress, a more intrusive media and a jaded public had brought the executive branch of
government to heel.
The triumph of style over substance
But the 1980s was a new and different decade. America was ready for a change and the New Right seized
its opportunity in the 1980 Presidential elections. Ronald Reagan, a former B-movie actor who had become
governor of California, won a landslide victory in the electoral college in November 1980. His undoubted
communication skills and ease in front of the cameras were used to full effect in putting across his simple
black-and-white choices to America. Reagan entered the White House with a bold agenda and strong team
around him. His Presidency was characterised by reductions in taxation, welfare programmes and the role
of the federal government. Concurrently defence spending and the federal budget deficit rocketed.
Reagan became the first President since Eisenhower to serve a full two terms in office. His masterful
1984 re-election campaign proclaimed that it was ‘Morning in America’ and more good times were on the
1111 way. He easily defeated the Democrat challenger, Walter Mondale, carrying all but one of the fifty states.
2111 But Reagan’s second term did not live up to the promise laid out by the hugely popular and seemingly
3 invincible ‘Great Communicator’. Those around him, such as Chief of Staff, Donald Regan, were vying for
4111 power and creating intrigue, and the National Security Adviser, John Poindexter, authorised an illegal
5 triangle of selling arms to the Iranians in return for their influence in the Middle East, with the funds from
6 the arms deals being covertly directed towards Nicaraguan rebels.
7 Following a recession in 1982 and 1983 the economy appeared to benefit from Reagan’s policies. When
8 coupled with the restoration of national pride following an incursion into Grenada and the successful Los
9 Angeles Olympic Games, his re-election was a foregone conclusion. But by 1987, the economy was in trouble
10111 again, entering a period that saw the sharpest falls on Wall Street since the 1930s. A staggering tenfold
1 increase in the national debt resulted in the haemorrhaging of tax dollars to pay the interest alone – and
2 a strong dollar had led to rising interest rates and a fivefold increase in America’s trade deficit. It would
3 all have seemed terribly familiar to Reagan had he possessed the intellectual curiosity to engage in an analysis
4 of the state of the nation. He had come to Washington on the back of Carter’s supposed poor economic
5 record and problems with Iran and now he too was in a not-dissimilar situation. The redeeming factor of
6 Reagan’s two-term Presidency was the final thawing of the Cold War, which followed his colossal arms
7 build-up and the coming to power of Mikhail Gorbachev in the Soviet Union.
8
9
20111 ‘It’s the economy, Stupid’
1
2 Ronald Reagan was always going to be a hard act to follow. He had been an incredibly popular President
3 with much of his appeal coming from his charm and a never-ending supply of folksy anecdotes and sound
4 bites. But his deputy and successor, George Bush, lacked the charisma that had served Reagan so well.
5 Foreign policy was to the fore of the Bush administration, which was not altogether surprising given that
6 he had served as the senior American representative to the UN under Nixon and Director of the CIA under
7 Ford. His one term in the White House from 1989 to 1993 oversaw the end of the Cold War and the expul-
8 sion of Iraq from Kuwait. Issues at home held less appeal and he failed to produce any major initiatives of
9 his own. During the 1988 elections Bush had defeated an equally uninspiring Democratic challenger,
30 Michael Dukakis, with a promise of a ‘kinder, gentler America’, which was taken to mean a more socially
1 aware continuation of Reagan’s policies. He had also promised not to raise taxes but found himself unable
2 to deliver on both accounts.
3 Though strong and successful on the international stage, Bush proved to be ineffective on domestic
4 policy. There were reforms concerning pollution, banking and an increase in the minimum wage, but his
5 initiatives fell far short of addressing America’s increasing economic and social problems. With Congress
6 in the hands of the Democrats, it is understandable why Bush sought to make his mark on foreign policy
7 but it was on domestic issues that action was required. Ultimately it was the economy more than any other
8 factor that undermined his credibility and led to his eventual defeat. In 1991, with America in the middle
9 of a depression, Bush realised that the federal budget deficit had to be reduced and so he raised taxes and
40 cut back on government spending. There was an absence of any feel good factor under Bush: the economy
1 was out of sorts and the President was not able to fill the void with illusions the way Reagan had. The gulf
2 between the American Dream and stark reality had grown too wide and by 1992 the people were ready to
3 endorse a Democrat candidate who promised to tackle the social and economic problems that had been
4 avoided for too long.
45 It is probably too soon to comment on how history will judge the Clinton years. His stewardship of
46 the economy was indisputably a success with most commentators highlighting the huge budget surplus and
47 years of growth during his two terms in office. Spending on social programmes such as Medicare and educa-
48 tional benefits were increased in keeping with campaign pledges, however the administration failed to deliver
49222 on promises of a national heath insurance scheme during the first term. Throughout his Presidency Clinton
was dogged by allegations concerning his personal morality as well as determined opposition from Congress,
most notably in 1995 when the Republicans, under the maverick leadership of Newt Gingrich, engaged in
a battle with the President that resulted in the temporary shutdown of the federal government. Despite his
successes and personal popularity both at home and abroad the consensus of early verdicts balance the
above with the spectacle of his impeachment and a feeling of missed opportunity.
The return of the right
The incumbent Vice-President, Al Gore, distanced himself from Clinton throughout the 2000 election
campaign and was narrowly defeated by George W. Bush. In the most controversial election in the nation’s
history, the failed oilman and governor of Texas had to rely on the Supreme Court for his eventual victory,
due to a contested result in Florida, a state where another son of former President George Bush is governor.
Generally considered to be a political lightweight, Bush has adopted a cabinet style of governing, relying
on trusted advisers, several of whom played a part in earlier Republican administrations. He has taken the
economy from record surplus to record deficit, after pushing Reaganesque tax cuts through Congress.
The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 precipitated a more hawkish foreign policy with the Truman
Doctrine of protecting freedom seemingly having been superseded by the ‘Bush Doctrine’, the pre-emptive
strike. Such was the shock of ‘9/11’ to a country which, in stark contrast to Europe, the twentieth century
had left unscarred by the ravages of war, that there followed arguable violations of civil liberties via the
Patriot Act, intended to protect the homeland by enhancing the powers of the state.
Figure 11.3 President Clinton with former Presidents George Bush, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter and
Gerald Ford at the funeral of Richard Nixon, 1994
ESSAYS • 283
1111 Given the nature of his election victory and a finely balanced Congress, Bush could hardly claim a
2111 convincing mandate for the right-wing agenda he set out to enact. The fact that the religious right, which
3 had appropriated the Republican Party in the 1980s, had one of its own in the White House was illustrated
4111 by Bush’s immediate moves to restrict the accessibility of family planning services. Some fear that Roe v.
5 Wade, the 1973 ruling that guaranteed the right to abortion, may now be threatened. Issues that divide
6 present-day America – abortion, gun-control, gay rights and health care – strike at the core of the nation
7 for they are in many ways simply contemporary manifestations of the sort of moral and political issues
8 that the Founding Fathers sought to resolve in establishing the United States of America.
9
10111
1
2
Part 2: Essays
3
4
5 The aims and impact of the ‘New Frontier’
6
7 1 What was the meaning of Kennedy’s ‘New Frontier’ and to what extent did he succeed in
8 delivering on his promises? (20)
9 (AQA)
20111
1 From the outset it must be said that domestic issues were not a priority for President Kennedy. Given that
2 the executive branch is freer to decide on foreign matters, it is understandable that numerous Presidents
3 have tended to concentrate more on external issues as they find their legislative path on the domestic
4 front blocked by America’s carefully crafted system of checks and balances. But during election season, it
5 is on domestic policy that a Presidential candidate must make their mark and John F. Kennedy certainly
6 accomplished this.
7 As a Presidential hopeful, Kennedy captured the imagination of many Americans with his vision of
8 the future. In November 1959, before the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, he depicted the Eisenhower reign
9 as ‘the years the locusts have eaten’ and made political capital of the notion that the Soviets had moved
30 ahead of the United States. He continued: ‘It is not too late . . . I think we can close the gap and pull ahead.
1 But to do this we must put an end to this depression of our national spirit – we must put all these dull,
2 gray years behind us and take on the rendezvous with destiny that is assigned us. We must regain the
3 American purpose and promise.’ This was the genesis of what would become known as the ‘New Frontier’.
4 As the Primary season advanced, Kennedy honed his rhetoric and his concepts before finally winning
5 the nomination of his party at the Democratic National Convention in July 1960 in Los Angeles. In his
6 acceptance speech, he told his audience that they stood on the edge of a New Frontier, a new decade of
7 hopes and threats. He gave a greater insight into his vision for a programme of legislation when he said:
8 ‘The New Frontier is here whether we seek it or not: unconquered pockets of ignorance and prejudice,
9 unanswered questions of poverty and surplus.’ He claimed that the New Frontier encompassed many areas,
40 including an expanding and ageing population, education, demographic movements, science and space and
1 even leisure time. These were the challenges that he laid out and he stated that the nation must accept and
2 tackle them with no uncertain commitment.
3 During the campaign Kennedy reiterated that the New Frontier was not an offer to America but a
4 challenge that required courage and conviction from the people and politicians alike. But was the New
45 Frontier anything more than a campaign ‘sound bite’? His eloquent and optimistic inaugural address on
46 20 January 1961 focused exclusively on America’s position on the world stage and one could be forgiven
47 for asking where were the civil rights pledges and the promises to tackle poverty? But still his challenge of
48 the New Frontier was implicit in his most famous line: ‘Ask not what your country can do for you – ask
49222 what you can do for your country.’
During the 1,000 days of Kennedy’s ‘Camelot’, the Cold War and its related space race were arguably
of paramount concern but the young President showed that he was willing to address the domestic chal-
lenges that he had highlighted. Education bills, notable civil rights gestures, raising the question of the
provision of health care, an anti-poverty drive and the Apollo programme all illustrate that he did not
simply forsake his campaign messages for the glamour of foreign policy. History has tended to castigate
President Kennedy as a domestic failure, a chief executive who had poor relations with Capitol Hill and
achieved little of note. However, upon closer inspection this verdict would appear to be too harsh.
Economic policy is arguably the key factor in determining the success of an administration. While
acknowledging that politicians are to a significant extent constrained by the economic cycle and events
beyond their control, it would be a fallacy to suggest that they have an unimportant role in economic
affairs. It has fallen to the President to steer the nation through the economic tides via, for example, the
manipulation of spending and borrowing and by promoting confidence in the economy.
Economists Seymour Harris and Walter Heller have described Kennedy as the first modern economist
in the American Presidency. His landmark Commencement Address at Yale University in June 1962 cer-
tainly illustrated that he was prepared to discard old myths and approach the management of the economy
in a careful and dispassionate way. The President questioned existing methods of measuring the federal
budget and public debt and argued that the economy could be managed scientifically as opposed to ideo-
logically. He went on to stress: ‘What is at stake in our economic decisions today is not some grand warfare
of rival ideologies but the practical management of a modern economy.’ This willingness to embrace the
future without the baggage of the past can be regarded as a bold and considered move by the young President.
Relations with the business community were for the most part constructive. Businessmen were natu-
rally suspicious of the incoming administration after eight years of Republican control of the executive
branch. Throughout the campaign and during his brief tenure in office, Kennedy sought the support of
business by reiterating that he was a friend of capitalism who wished to ‘serve it as well as it has served us’.
He stressed the importance of economic growth to his dream of taking America forward. Following reces-
sions in 1958 and 1960 the public and business were prepared to listen to his ideas. An early example of
his willingness to support business was the offering of tax breaks to companies that modernised or actively
looked for new ventures. There was a recovery, the so-called Kennedy ‘boom’ of spring 1961 that ushered
in a long cycle of prosperity. In his thorough analysis of Kennedy’s economic policies Jim Heath stated
that Kennedy’s early policies were effective in helping to bring prosperity. Accordingly Kennedy should be
credited for the part he played in this.
Not all went well for JFK with the business community however. In April 1962 a battle of wills took
place with the steel industry when the President intervened in wage and price structures. For the good of
the economy as a whole, it was necessary to keep down the price of this basic commodity. This involved
asking the unions to keep their wage increase requests to a modest level, a task in which Kennedy was
successful. But the mighty US Steel refused to keep its side of the bargain and increased prices, much to
the President’s anger. He utilised every weapon at his disposal, for example, ordering the federal govern-
ment only to deal with steel companies that had maintained prices at their present level, and was quickly
able to force the giant corporation to back down.
In the realm of social policy, Kennedy faced stiff opposition but still managed to win some rounds
with Congress and also paved the way for his successor’s Great Society programme. Hugh Brogan has
claimed it is a myth that Kennedy was uninterested in domestic politics and inadequate in his dealings with
Congress. He paints a picture of a man who cared about the less fortunate and was prepared to address
urgent social issues. Kennedy was instrumental in tackling the problem of poverty, pushing for a 25 per
cent rise in the minimum wage in 1961 and issuing executive orders to speed up the distribution of food
to the poor. The American historian, Arthur Schlesinger, has also praised Kennedy’s domestic actions,
for example his proposal of tax cuts in 1963 to help reduce unemployment. He portrays the Kennedy
brothers as people who cared deeply about social injustice and who were moved to fight continually for
the dispossessed with various executive programmes.
ESSAYS • 285
1111 The President’s reluctance to take significant action on civil rights appears to contradict this image.
2111 But Kennedy was cautious on this sensitive issue because he needed to keep Southern support within
3 Congress, rather than through indifference. If he had been too active, Southern conservatives would have
4111 made the legislative process even more difficult for him, possibly leading to the blocking of measures that
5 would prove beneficial to the plight of African Americans, such as the increase in the minimum wage.
6 An area of social policy to which Kennedy was deeply committed was education. The education system
7 was facing a crisis due to a lack of investment. Shortages of teachers and facilities were all too evident
8 during these ‘baby boom’ years and once more it fell to the federal government to rectify the situation.
9 Improved education was an integral part of the New Frontier and Kennedy wasted little time in addressing
10111 the issue. He proposed giving financial aid to the states to help to pay for education but felt that, due to
1 his religion and the close scrutiny of his critics, who were keen to seize upon any transgression of the sepa-
2 ration between church and state, religious schools could not benefit from the funding. After being defeated
3 in the House with his education initiatives in both 1961 and 1962, a more moderate version that focused
4 exclusively upon further education was accepted in 1963.
5 Other victories on the domestic front included the establishment of the Peace Corps, a volunteer organ-
6 isation for young people who were prepared to accept their President’s challenge to ask what they could
7 do for their country. Advancements in the treatment of the mentally ill were inspired by his eldest sister’s
8 plight and he furthered the case for the setting-up of a federally backed medical insurance scheme that
9 would be of great benefit to the elderly. And of course it was during his Presidency that the United States
20111 committed itself to going to the moon, thus boosting the nation’s pride, previously dented by the Soviet
1 Union’s initial lead in the space race.
2 Accordingly it appears just to conclude that Kennedy actually deserves a verdict of ‘reasonably
3 successful’ for his achievements at home during his short time in office. Progress towards his New Frontier
4 was made though there was still a lot of work to be done. By his own admission, foreign policy was Kennedy’s
5 priority and it follows that greater focus on domestic issues would have been possible. As Kennedy himself
6 remarked to Nixon: ‘ Who gives a damn if the minimum wage is $1.15 or $1.25 compared to something
7 like Cuba.’ Above all, it should be borne in mind that the constitutional position of the Presidency allows
8 for a much greater degree of freedom in the sphere of foreign policy than domestic policy, where the exec-
9 utive branch must contend with the powerful forces on Capitol Hill and the powers that are retained by
30 the individual states.
1 Kennedy had his problems with Congress but these were not due to a lack of interest or poor political
2 manoeuvring. He held a very slim mandate from the American people and had to contend with established
3 conservative elements in Congress. Kennedy did in fact take on and defeat the powerful House Committee
4 on Rules, which had threatened to stand in the way of any progressive proposals and was well placed to
5 do just that. It is another example of a Kennedy domestic victory that was hard fought for and was to pay
6 dividends later for Lyndon Johnson. It is clear that a major reason why he was not able to fully realise his
7 domestic vision was due to opposition from Congress, a situation he hoped would improve following the
8 elections of 1964. It was with this in mind that he decided to undertake a tour of two populous states,
9 Florida and Texas, during which he was assassinated in Dallas in November 1963.
40
1
2 Explaining the legislative impact of Lyndon Johnson
3
4 2 Account for the passage of the raft of liberal legislation between 1964 and 1966. (20)
45 (AQA)
46
47 Arguably the greatest period of progressive law-making in US history was ushered in by the unexpected
48 accession of Lyndon Johnson. His Great Society programme had the best of intentions: to break the
49222 cycle of poverty in which many millions of Americans were seemingly trapped. Although Johnson never
considered a significant redistribution of the nation’s wealth by increasing progressive taxation and building
a European-style welfare state, his measures went beyond those of the New Deal, Fair Deal and New Frontier
in their depth. Given America’s individualist ethic, federal system and the ‘harmonious system of mutual
frustration’ that is Washington DC, it was quite an achievement.
Johnson’s personal background gave him first-hand knowledge of poverty and also the iron will to
tackle it, which his well-heeled predecessors had lacked. He came from rural west Texas, the son of a local
politician with whom he often travelled when he was attending to constituents’ needs. He held a succes-
sion of menial jobs, including that of shoeshine boy before graduating from teachers’ college in 1930. His
upbringing and experiences in teaching poor children were to stay with him throughout his political career.
As he told Congress in 1965 during the debates on the Voting Rights Bill: ‘Somehow you never forget what
poverty and hatred can do when you see its scars on the hopeful face of a young child.’
Together with his sincere empathy, Johnson had a formidable array of political skills on which he could
draw in his dealings with Congress. He was initially a member of the House of Representatives before
running for the Senate in 1948. He was shrewd in choosing his friends and in taking up positions on legis-
lation and soon became the Chief Democrat, or Minority Leader in the Senate. As Majority Leader from
1955, he honed his skills, cajoling and flattering, prodding and bullying in an effort to build support.
Although no great speaker, he was the master of back-room politics, where difficult customers were given
‘the treatment’ and would often come away feeling as though they had been mugged. As President, Johnson
drew on all his experiences, skills and knowledge of legislators to win over Congress.
He was aided in his task of building a reforming consensus by the shock and sympathy that stemmed
from John F. Kennedy’s death. He wisely chose to portray himself as the person to execute the late President’s
programme, thus harnessing the nation’s grief in order to unite the country behind the quest to alleviate
poverty. Kennedy had been a late convert to civil rights and Johnson himself had had reservations about
the wisdom of sending the Civil Rights Bill to Congress due to the fear that it would wreck the rest of his
programme. But once in the White House he successfully urged Congress to enact the legislation in
Kennedy’s memory. His predecessor’s tax cut proposals were also realised in 1964, as was the long-standing
Kennedy goal of giving federal aid to schools, in 1965.
Two of the greatest weapons a President can hold are a compliant Congress and a clear mandate from
the people. The elections of 1964 delivered both to President Johnson. When faced with the competent
inheritor of Kennedy’s ‘Camelot’, Republican candidate Barry Goldwater’s move to the extreme right, saw
61 per cent of voters opt for Johnson, the largest share of the popular vote a President had received. Now
in power by his own right and with the mass of public opinion behind him, Johnson’s confidence knew
no bounds. The Democrats also consolidated their hold on both Houses of Congress (68 to 32 in the Senate
and 295 to 140 in the House of Representatives). Johnson knew many members personally or had helped
them to office as they were swept in on his coat-tails. This massive following in Congress made Johnson
virtually unstoppable in the mid-1960s.
If Johnson was the right man to push through a programme such as the Great Society, it should also
be said that it was the right time. Pressure had been growing since the turn of the twentieth century, when
progressives had urged America to take collective action to provide a way out for the unfortunate. Franklin
Roosevelt had made modest advances, but even though the New Deal of the 1930s had broken new ground
it had fallen short on issues such as health care. Johnson, however, was not prepared to squander his glorious
opportunity and, following his election, he oversaw the extension of medical cover to the elderly and low-
waged, among many other reforms that had long been sought by liberals. It is somewhat ironic and
fortuitous that it was a son of the South, a fiercely conservative region, who held office when the timing
was right to pursue this type of agenda.
Finally, the nature of the legislation itself holds clues to its safe passage through Congress. With regard
to health care, Franklin Roosevelt had been unwilling to take on the might of the medical community but
Johnson ensured their consent by allowing doctors to charge the same rates for all patients irrespective of
ESSAYS • 287
1111 the basis of their cover. Furthermore, he sidestepped any charges of merely providing welfare when he
2111 insisted that Medicare would be made available to all elderly people, their financial status notwithstanding.
3 Similarly on education, the issues that had dogged Kennedy’s attempts at reform were avoided by providing
4111 help based on pupils’ needs rather than the status of the schools themselves.
5 The safe passage of the Great Society legislation stands as a testament to Lyndon Johnson’s will-power,
6 political skill and the times themselves. Arguably it had to be a Southerner who managed to neutralise
7 the entrenched power of the Democratic South in Washington and fashion a liberal agenda that would
8 have surprised his ‘political father’, F.D. Roosevelt. A Washington insider from the age of 24 when he
9 became assistant to a congressman, Johnson had a wealth of experience on which to draw. He never took
10111 Congress for granted and carefully cultivated the unity that he craved for his legislation. He once declared:
1 ‘Without constant attention from the administration, most legislation moves through the congressional
2 process at the speed of a glacier.’ He knew this better than anyone and would often instruct his staff to
3 give a high priority to maintaining good relations with the legislature (Davidson and Oleszek). Throughout
4 his Presidency, Johnson showed himself to be the most effective post-war President in winning support for
5 issues on which he took a clear stance. Kennedy had performed admirably with Congress but Johnson,
6 with his potentially more polarising Great Society agenda, gave a masterclass to all who would follow on
7 how to manipulate the cumbersome American legislative process.
8
9 3 Was President Johnson’s war on poverty a success? (20)
20111 (AQA)
1
2
3 Essay plan
4
Introduction: Comment on the scale of the problem and LBJ’s opportunity and willingness to tackle it.
5
6 Para 1: The broad approach taken to reduce poverty. Tax Revenue Act (the bottom rate of tax was cut
7 from 20 per cent to 16 per cent), Medicare Act (20 million elderly people eligible for federal health
8 cover), Medicaid Act (cover for the low-waged), education measures, e.g. Head Start programme
9 (helped young disadvantaged children with nutrition among other things).
30
Para 2: Consider the position of African Americans and assess the Civil Rights Act (discrimination in
1
employment illegal) and Voting Rights Act.
2
3 Para 3: Assess self-help measures such as Economic Opportunity Act (loans for the development of rural
4 and small businesses), Jobs Corps (work training programme for drop-outs), Vista (a domestic
5 Peace Corps) and Community Action Programs.
6
7 Para 4: Conservative historians, e.g. Charles Murray, have downplayed the advances made claiming that
8 deficit spending slowed down the rate of growth, and giving federal tax dollars in aid amounted
9 to nothing more than handouts encouraging dependency and anti-social behaviour.
40 Para 5: Present the liberal historians’ counterargument: low-waged not deterred from working by modest
1 welfare payments, cost of Great Society was dwarfed by military spending, and the actual amounts
2 spent were lower than those claimed by some conservative historians.
3
4 Conclusion: Use official poverty statistics to illustrate degree of success: 1959 – 21 per cent in poverty, 1969
45 – 12 per cent. Economic growth as well as LBJ’s programmes contributed to this. The war on
46 poverty had promised more than it ever delivered and had raised false hopes but the very real
47 increase in living standards that millions of families experienced represents a significant amount
48 of success.
49222
The causes and consequences of Watergate
4 Assess the causes and consequences of Watergate. (20)

(AQA)
The political scandal that became known as Watergate was much more than a botched break-in at
Democratic headquarters by people acting on behalf of President Nixon. In many ways it represents the
zenith of an increase in executive power that had been under way for decades as the White House assumed
more power over the governance of the United States. However, under Nixon the power of the Presidency
went beyond accepted norms and took on an imperial feel as he sought to undermine challenges to his
administration. The reasons for these transgressions can be partly explained by the social unrest at the time,
which led Nixon to believe that America was under attack from within. But, arguably, they are more firmly
rooted in the psyche of Nixon himself and his immediate advisers. In seeing opposition to his policies as
a threat to national security, Nixon demonstrated his over-inflated opinions of self-worth and his resorting
to underhand dealings illustrated a suspicious state of mind.
Nixon can aptly be described as an imperial President. He was not reserved in using the full powers
of his office in pursuit of his goals. He had a strained relationship with Congress and is remembered as
one of the most uncooperative Presidents for his blocking of Congressional hearings by refusing access to
records or personnel. He also used the power of impounding funds from programmes more frequently
than any of his forebears. This is exemplified best by his impounding half the funding in the Clean Water
Act of 1972 after Congress had overturned his veto on the legislation.
Nixon was clearly willing to take strong action with Congress but it was his use of dirty tricks against
his perceived enemies that led to his fall. The leaking of information on Vietnam to the New York Times
in 1971 by an administration official had led to the formation of a team of ‘plumbers’ to fix such leaks.
The use of surveillance and an illegal break-in to seize medical records with which to discredit the official
duly followed. Nixon’s reaction to the leaking of the ‘Pentagon Papers’ set a precedent that was to culminate
in Watergate.
For the 1972 elections Nixon created a separate campaign group entitled the Committee to Re-elect the
President (CREEP). Given the absence of an effective opposition this appears to have been a move based
on fear rather than reality. With a fund of millions, much of which allegedly came from illegal contribu-
tions, they worked to secure Nixon’s re-election in November. The break-in at the Watergate building
occurred on 17 June 1972. Five men were apprehended while adjusting eavesdropping equipment in the
Democratic Party headquarters. It was not headline news as a White House connection was not apparent
and no one outside of Nixon’s circle could have guessed what the story would become.
Over the coming months investigations by Congress, the federal judiciary and the Washington Post
found evidence and testimony that linked the burglars to CREEP. It transpired that Nixon had not known
of the break-in but had authorised a cover-up, which involved the manipulation and obstruction of the
CIA and FBI. By July 1974 time was running out for Nixon. Tape-recordings existed of every conversation
held within the Oval Office but Nixon had resisted their release by claiming executive privilege. In a unan-
imous decision, the Supreme Court demanded that they be handed over. The House voted three formal
articles of impeachment against Nixon for the cover-up and abuse of office.
The most obvious consequence of the Watergate scandal was the resignation of President Nixon. It
transpired that the Nixon administration had repeatedly resorted to dirty tricks and what can be deemed
abuses of office, of which the break-in and the cover-up represented the final acts. Nixon did everything
in his power and more besides to save his Presidency but the weight of evidence was far too great. He
vowed to fight before the Senate, who, according to the Constitution, were to deliver the verdict on impeach-
ment. But his closest aides knew the game was up and abandoned him. The Secretary of Defense went so
far as to order military commanders to ignore Nixon’s orders. The President realised that the Senate would
ESSAYS • 289
1111 vote a verdict of guilty and so on 8 August 1974 he announced to America and the world that he would
2111 resign. In his remaining twenty years, Nixon managed to regain a degree of respectability but failed to offer
3 the nation an apology for his wrongdoings.
4111 However, the most significant impact of Watergate was the damage that it did to the office of the
5 Presidency itself rather than just the incumbent who had created the scandal. Congress had already acknow-
6 ledged its intent to rein in the imperial Presidency in diplomatic and military affairs, largely due to Nixon’s
7 behaviour in Southeast Asia. In the aftermath of Nixon’s resignation and with the White House’s standing
8 at an all time low, it was to be expected that the legislature would seek to enhance its position. It approached
9 its role of overseer of the executive branch with renewed zeal. For example, the Senate launched a thorough
10111 investigation into the activities of the CIA both at home and abroad.
1 Bob Woodward, the journalist and writer whose name is the one most closely associated with Watergate
2 after Nixon’s, devoted a whole book to the impact of Watergate in 1999. In Shadow, Woodward examined
3 how Presidents and executive agencies since 1974 have faced closer scrutiny from both Congress and the
4 media. The Iran-Contra scandal during Reagan’s second term and the never-ending investigations into
5 Bill Clinton’s financial and personal relationships that led to his impeachment, are the most notable
6 episodes, but they can be viewed as part of a growing trend of increased Congressional scrutiny in the after-
7 math of Watergate. Although it should be borne in mind that Woodward had a vested interest in
8 emphasising the importance of Watergate he nevertheless presents a thorough and compelling case for this
9 increase in scrutiny and its source. The confirmation that even a President could be a crook forced Congress
20111 to increase its own surveillance of the executive. Woodward’s analysis is certainly closer to the mark
1
than the view expressed in Richard Nixon’s autobiography that Watergate would prove to be only a foot-
2
note in history.
3
The fallout from Watergate was not confined within Washington DC’s Beltway. It spread out across
4
the nation invoking even greater levels of cynicism and mistrust of politicians within the American people.
5
The November 1974 mid-term elections illustrated the public’s estrangement from politics, with voter
6
turnout falling to only 38 per cent. This should, however, be balanced against the fact that Americans have
7
always held a certain amount of contempt for politics and Washington DC; it could be said that their
8
existing views were simply confirmed by Watergate. The Nixon White House years did more than just
9
amplify disillusionment with politicians; the nation’s view of itself was affected as well. The bicentennial
30
1 celebrations of the United States in 1976 were, untypically for the Americans, a somewhat muted affair,
2 which represented the self-doubt that had entered the nation’s psyche, as it could see itself falling short of
3 the noble values from which it was born. But above all else, it was the devaluing of America’s most prized
4 institution, the Presidency, in the eyes of the people as well as the other branches of government that was
5 the real legacy of Watergate.
6 It is clear that Watergate had a huge impact upon the United States in various ways and that its conse-
7 quences in the short term, Nixon’s resignation and the elevation of Gerald Ford to the White House, are
8 equalled by the longer-term damage that it did to the Presidency. Can it be said that anything positive
9 arose from Watergate? The suffix ‘gate’ subsequently entered the English language for scandals involving
40 politicians (Irangate, Monicagate) thus ensuring the episode will remain in public consciousness. And at
1 least America could console itself that the Constitution’s checks and balances were demonstrated to be
2 working well in the end. After all an incumbent President, the most powerful man in the world, had been
3 brought down by a system designed nearly 200 years previously. James Madison would have approved.
4
45 PRACTICE QUESTION
46
47 5 To what extent may factors other than Watergate be blamed for the loss of people’s
48 faith in the Presidency? (20)
49222 (AQA)
The problems that beset Gerald Ford
6 Why was Gerald Ford unable to make the Presidency his? (20)
(AQA)
The former House Minority Leader, Gerald Ford of Michigan, took over the Presidency when Richard
Nixon left Washington on 9 August 1974. In a sense he was an illegitimate President given that he had not
even been elected to the Vice-Presidency in the first place. Ford had replaced Spiro Agnew in October 1973
following the exposure of wrongdoings by the long-time Nixon cohort during his earlier governorship of
Maryland. Ford had an impressive Congressional record and a reputation of being an honest and straight-
forward character. Throughout America there was a sense of relief that the crises of the last few years were
drawing to a close and initially considerable goodwill was shown towards the likeable mid-westerner.
But the ghost of Nixon was to haunt the Ford White House and seriously undermine the new President’s
credibility. Ford’s first month in office was dominated by the issuing of a Presidential pardon to Nixon.
The latter’s acceptance of such a pardon could be viewed as an admission of guilt and would, Ford hoped,
draw a line under the affair. However, many suspected that the two had struck a deal during Nixon’s final
days, namely that Nixon would step down and hand the Presidency to his deputy in return for a full pardon.
There had been a meeting that had hinted at this but afterwards, following advice from those around him,
Ford had clearly outlined his position: that he was not amenable to such a proposal.
In retrospect it might have been wiser for Nixon to stand trial. It would have allowed a full and public
closure to Watergate. The pardon spared the nation a traumatic trial and the indignity of jailing the former
President but arguably blood letting of this nature was exactly what was required. Ford’s view was that
Watergate had done enough damage already and it was time for the nation to move on. Richard Nixon
had paid for his misdemeanours with his job, reputation and health. But rumours of a deal between Nixon
and Ford would not subside. On 17 October 1974 President Ford had to appear before a Congressional
sub-committee to deny these suspicions. Congress wound down their investigation into Ford’s accession
to power, but the allegations tainted his Presidency from beginning to end.
The American people registered their displeasure in the mid-term elections of November 1974. As
expected the Republicans fared badly, with their share of the House of Representatives falling to just 139.
With opposing parties holding the White House and Congress the only foreseeable outcome was gridlock
on the legislative front. But the 38 per cent turnout indicated that it was not just the Republicans
whose standing had fallen. It was amply clear that the people were more disenchanted than ever with their
politicians and federal institutions. These feelings were still evident nearly two years later as the nation
approached its bicentennial. Under more favourable conditions, the 200th ‘birthday party’ of the United
States would have been an epiphany of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. But the muted celebra-
tions of 4 July 1976 illustrated the continuing self-doubt of the nation and did nothing to aid the standing
of President Ford.
The last Vice-President to be promoted to the White House unexpectedly had been Lyndon Johnson,
following the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963. Johnson had had little difficulty in making the
Presidency his. He was the consummate back-room politician and had the advantage of having the consent
of the nation and the cooperation of Congress. Furthermore he had a legislative programme, partly inher-
ited and partly his own, to enact. Gerald Ford held none of these cards. Unlike Johnson, he had no burning
desire to introduce legislation. He was essentially a reactive President, responding to events and the
initiatives of Congress.
Domestically Ford the President was the same as Ford the House Minority Leader. He wished to see
the degree of federal government intervention in people’s lives decrease. He also sought to bring the
economy under control by balancing the federal budget. But increases in unemployment in early 1975
prompted him to reduce taxation, which obviously represented a backwards step from this goal. He made
ESSAYS • 291
1111 great use of the power the President holds to check Congress with his liberal use of the veto on Congressional
2111 legislation. His opposition to Democratic spending programmes continued throughout his Presidency
3 and did little to create jobs and endear him to the electorate. In fairness it should be borne in mind that
4111 Ford had inherited a grave economic situation with inflation and unemployment both rising to worrying
5 levels. But his backtracking created a sense of confusion and his attempts to control inflation made him
6 appear weak.
7 With only two years in the White House and lacking any sort of mandate, it was predictable that the
8 Ford administration would be little more than a caretaker administration. But his brief tenure had the
9 potential to be cathartic for the nation as it oversaw the end of the imperial Presidency, Watergate and
10111 Vietnam. Consequently the deep wounds that had opened up in America could start to heal, although Ford
1 was too closely associated with the past to be able to prosper from this process. He attempted to draw a
2 line under Vietnam by implementing a scheme whereby draft dodgers would be granted amnesty in return
3 for undertaking a period of public service. The scheme came to a premature end due to its lack of appeal
4 but not before it had aroused the anger of a proportion of veterans and the families of the 58,000 American
5 casualties. And in April 1975, as the last American personnel were evacuated from Saigon, it was made
6 evident to all that the war had been for nothing. At home and abroad the United States had been seen to
7 fail in a manner that was both highly visible and humiliating.
8 Overall the Ford Presidency fell short of what America needed from its chief executive at the time. His
9 low-key, humbler approach provided a timely departure from the imperialism of Nixon and helped arrest
20111 the degradation of the office in the eyes of the public. Real though this achievement was, more fundamental
1 redemption was needed. It was vital that respectability be restored to the position that above everything
2 else symbolises the United States and binds it together as a nation. Along with his pardoning of Nixon and
3 constant vetoing, Ford is, rather unfairly, remembered best for his gaffes. He lived up to Lyndon Johnson’s
4 jibe ‘That Gerald Ford. He can’t fart and chew gum at the same time’, when he fell down the steps of Air
5 Force One. A rather cruel Saturday Night Live sketch showed the President stumbling around the Oval
6 Office, his foot in the waste-paper basket and his head caught in the curtains. In keeping with the best
7 comedy, it was just an exaggeration of the truth for millions of Americans. The media seemed to delight
8 in making fun of the Yale Law School graduate whose eschewing of sound bites and glib remarks made
9 him stand out from the typical type of politician.
30 The weak position of President Ford was reflected within the Republican Party itself. His Vice-President,
1 Nelson Rockefeller, publicly announced that he would not stand alongside Ford if he chose to run for the
2 Presidency in 1976 following an altercation with the President. Rockefeller had disagreed with Ford’s deci-
3 sion to make personnel changes within the foreign and military departments. And when Ford finally made
4 his decision to run for office, he faced a protracted battle from his party’s right wing. When he eventually
5 prevailed against challenger Ronald Reagan, the party still managed to get Ford to adopt policies with which
6 he felt ill at ease. He nearly overcame a huge gap in the opinion polls to beat his Democrat challenger,
7 Jimmy Carter, but it was not to be. In sum, Ford was a well-meaning stopgap President. The truth was
8 that he had never really wanted the job and, by the time he had grown into the office, he had lost the
9 position to Jimmy Carter in the elections of 1976.
40
1
2 Was Jimmy Carter a Presidential failure?
3
4 7 How much truth is there in the commonly held assertion that Jimmy Carter represents
45 another Presidential failure for the United States? (20)
46 (AQA)
47
48 Carter is usually portrayed as a President who presided over a period of ongoing transition, from the im-
49222 perialism of Johnson and Nixon to the era of limited government in the 1980s. He suffered the indignity
of being a one-term President, his tenure being brought to an end by Ronald Reagan’s landslide victory in
1980. It is tempting to castigate Carter as another Gerald Ford, a caretaker President with few ideas of his
own, whose main offering was his integrity. It is argued that after his four years in office America’s self-
image and economy had not improved, and the country delivered its opinion on his performance in no
uncertain terms at the ballot box. But in recent times Jimmy Carter’s Presidency and the legacy he left have
received a less harsh hearing and some would claim that he has become ‘America’s best ex-President’ –
such is the gap between the usual contemporary verdict and more modern reappraisals of his impact.
Carter’s background explains much of his appeal to the American people in the mid-1970s. The
antithesis of a slick politician he was no Washington insider and was therefore able to present himself as
exactly the kind of pure, honest candidate that was needed after Nixon and his pardoner, Ford. After a
distinguished career in the navy, he had moved into the family business of peanut farming in his native
Georgia. Following in the footsteps of his father, a local politician, he entered the Georgia Senate in 1962
before becoming governor in 1970. His first gubernatorial race in 1966 had failed, following which he had
gone through a period of introspection and emerged a born-again Christian. His undoubted faith and
the honesty he exuded, coupled with his reputation as an efficient manager, saw him win the Democratic
nomination for the 1976 Presidential elections. In an age where a candidate’s personality was coming to
matter as much as their programme, Carter overcame his low national profile to defeat Ford, though the
election was much closer than it should have been. Carter had seen his initial healthy lead in the opinion
polls wither away which illustrates that he was not a gifted campaigner and communicator. These were
indications of the weaknesses that would handicap his administration, but for now America wanted a chief
executive in whom they could believe. After his inauguration, President Jimmy Carter walked down
Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.
In evaluating a President’s performance the stewardship of the economy is high among the defining
criteria. President Carter’s unimpressive record on the economy seems beyond doubt to many commen-
tators, though it can be said that the main problem, that of continuing energy shortages, was largely outside
his control. Following the Yom Kippur War in 1973 oil prices had increased fourfold. A gas shortage during
the severe winter of 1976/7 and a coal miners’ strike worsened the situation under Carter. The energy crisis
was a contributory cause of increases in inflation and interest rates. Inflation reached 13 per cent in 1979
and Carter’s response of introducing credit controls resulted in a short recession. His economic record is
remembered for headline-making inflation and 21 per cent interest rates but other economic indicators
illustrate that things were not all bad. Underlying economic growth was strong, unemployment was rela-
tively low and the budget deficit was reduced.
However, reducing spending in order to cut the deficit was not what everyone in Washington wanted
to see. Relations between the administration and the Democrat-controlled Congress were characterised by
Carter’s gut feeling, according to Vice-President Walter Mondale, that politics was a sinful business and
consequently politicians were best held at arms length. Accordingly, relations were not as warm as they
could have been. After only a week, senior Democrats in both Houses were complaining to the press about
a lack of consultation from the White House. The new President was not an outgoing character. Carter
himself admits that he is a loner and his White House was certainly a contrast to the glitz of Kennedy’s
‘Camelot’. Building alliances between the executive and legislature and maintaining them is crucial to the
success of domestic legislation. But Carter relied upon trusted Georgians rather than seasoned professionals
who knew how to work Washington and were accustomed to its give-and-take nature. The administra-
tion’s ineptitude in Washington is illustrated by their dealings with House Speaker Tip O’Neill. He was
annoyed at not being allocated extra tickets for the inauguration and amazed that it took Carter’s official
in charge of Congressional liaison several months to drop by and introduce himself.
The administration’s apparent ineptitude in dealing with Congress certainly had a detrimental
effect on Carter’s legislative agenda. In his memoirs Keeping Faith, Carter tells of the steep learning curve
his team faced, and he attempts to redeem his reputation by relating at length how he sought the friend-
ship and cooperation of key members of Congress from both parties. However, the wider context perhaps
ESSAYS • 293
1111 exonerates Carter to a greater degree. Power within Congress was becoming more dispersed as the number
2111 of committees and sub-committees multiplied. Concurrently the parties’ strengths and abilities were
3 declining and a new breed of ‘Watergate Babies’ in Congress were finding no shame in showing themselves
4111 to be independent-minded (King). So it comes as a surprise to find that Carter had a 77 per cent success
5 rate with Congress on issues where he took a clear stance. Furthermore, this success rate was constant
6 (Presidents usually suffer a drop during the latter half of their administrations).
7 Carter’s domestic programme was characterised by attempts to promote efficiency and increase oppor-
8 tunity. He was not afraid to tackle a number of contentious issues head-on at the same time, even though
9 contemporary wisdom was to deal with just one or two significant issues simultaneously. Presidential-
10111 inspired legislation under Carter made moves to overcome racial discrimination, protect the environment,
1 create jobs, increase aid to students and reduce the federal budget deficit. The administration and Congress
2 had serious disagreements over water projects such as the building of unnecessary dams in congressmen’s
3 districts. Carter did not approve of this blatant ‘pork barrel legislation’ and eventually won a hard-earned
4 partial victory on the matter. Notable defeats for the President included welfare and tax reform and ambi-
5 tious plans for a national health care programme.
6 Carter’s policies often took on established interests and were introduced in a rush to a Congress that
7 all too often had not been consulted to the degree to which it was accustomed. But he deserves credit for
8 doing what he deemed to be right and history has shown that the many of the decisions he made were
9 correct in the long term irrespective of the immediate consequences. A case in point is defence policy.
20111 Carter found himself under considerable pressure to authorise the construction of the B-1 bomber but he
1 resisted because of the expense when compared to the number of jobs it would create and its limited future
2 tactical use. He took on the powerful weapons manufacturers and their lobbyists in Washington and won
3 the argument. His administration opted for the development and construction of cruise missiles and stealth
4 jets, which proved their worth in the Gulf War of 1990–1.
5 Another example of Carter taking on the lobbies and congressmen was his drive to introduce his
6 national energy policy. With the costs of energy rocketing and the level of consumption and oil imports
7 increasing the President was determined to tackle an issue that made the US so vulnerable. He devoted his
8 first ‘fireside chat’ to energy in an effort to win over the American people. But Congress was not involved
9 in drawing up the resulting legislation and was presented with a complex bill on which they chose to dig
30 in their heels. Carter was also disgruntled by the influence that the oil companies exerted through their
1 lobbyists in the capital. Carter’s poor tactical sense and the nature of the issue ensured that he would face
2 an uphill struggle. It lasted for three years and the resulting total energy programme was, in true Washington
3 style, a compromise that pleased no one completely. But, as a result, US consumption declined and oil
4 imports fell. In fact by the mid-1980s the US had an oil surplus but it was too late for Carter to accept the
5 political credit. Walter Mondale highlighted the dilemma succinctly: ‘Under Carter we always front-loaded
6 the pain and back-loaded the pleasure. We did what we had to do. We paid a heavy price for it and the
7 country benefited, and so did Ronald Reagan’ (Doyle).
8 If Carter is found wanting economically and politically, a strong case can be made for him restoring
9 a good measure of the faith in America’s leaders and institutions that had been lost through Vietnam and
40 Watergate. In retrospect Carter was exactly what America needed at that moment in time. He had
1 campaigned on the promise that he would ‘never tell a lie to the American people’, and the people had
2 responded positively to the somewhat dour but genuine Georgian. His televised fireside chats from the
3 White House library delivered in a cardigan, his lack of pomp and ceremony, and his frugal administra-
4 tion (for example, he charged officials $1.75 for breakfast during meetings) all helped restore America’s
45 faith in the office of the Presidency. By 1980 the people were ready to revert to type and elected a more
46 traditional type of President.
47 Events abroad contributed a great deal to Carter’s election defeat by Reagan in 1980. He had had some
48 great successes in foreign policy, such as the Panama Canal treaties, the SALT II agreement with the Soviets,
49222 and the Camp David Accords, where he brokered a lasting peace between Israel and Egypt. But his response
to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was to introduce export bans, which hit farmers and businesses, and
a boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics, which hurt American athletes and national pride more than it
did the Soviets, who simply won more medals. Carter was to suffer an agonising end to his term following
a failed attempt to rescue hostages from the American embassy in Tehran, taken following the overthrow
of the Shah in November 1979. Eight soldiers had died and the Secretary of State had resigned over the
failed rescue. America appeared impotent and Carter was running out of credibility. Americans no longer
wished to see their most potent national symbol appearing weak and discredited. They removed Jimmy
Carter and replaced him with a chief executive who was able to make them feel good about themselves.
Carter’s last two days in office were spent trying to secure the release of the hostages but the Iranians cruelly
waited until Reagan was sworn in before allowing them to leave their soil. Carter had had to be physically
helped from the Oval Office that day to witness the swearing in of his successor.
8 ‘The Reagan Presidency represents the triumph of style over substance.’ Discuss. (20)
(AQA)
From the outset it can be said that the quotation contains a large degree of truth. The Reagan years were
characterised by the President’s personal charm and attributes, namely his consummate ability to connect
with the people via a medium with which he felt at obvious ease. And with regard to the substance of his
two terms, Reagan’s economic, social and defence policies represented a significant break with the past and
it seems no exaggeration to talk in terms of a ‘Reagan revolution’. But the success of these policies is open
to question. Many claim that his early economic policies were instrumental in bringing prosperity in the
mid-1980s and there can be no doubting the strong performance of the economy in these years. But this
fact must be set against the social cost of his initiatives and the staggering increase in the national debt that
would be bequeathed to future generations.
In terms of style, Ronald Reagan appeared to be almost everything America wanted from its leader.
Very importantly, he was strong. He showed his willingness to stand tall against the ‘evil empire’ of the
Soviet Union and to defend the United States with his Strategic Defense Initiative (‘Star Wars’). Reagan’s
bold stance provided a contrast to the perceived impotence of American might under Carter and Ford, and
from his strength the nation could repair its damaged self-esteem. He was even able to demonstrate his
vigour and bravery in his personal life following an assassination attempt in 1981. Although he was the
oldest man to be inaugurated as President he made a swift and thorough recovery from the shooting and
charmed the nation with self-depreciating quips about the incident.
One of Reagan’s appellations was ‘the Great Communicator’. With over 50 minor films to his credit,
numerous commercials and years on the corporate- and political-speaking circuit, he knew how to reach
out to people with an ease and flair that no previous occupant of the White House ever had. He was a
straight talker who instinctively put across his messages as simple, black-and-white issues: for example, the
Cold War was a battle between good and evil – cowboys and Indians on the international stage. He avoided
detail, opting instead to present generic visions to his audience. His folksy simplicity reassured people in
good times and bad and suggested that the nation had a leader who was in control of the big picture and
had a vision of where it was heading.
Reagan’s communication skills were invaluable to achieving his vision. He would appeal directly to
the people over the heads of Congress to win their backing for his proposals and thus reduce the ability of
the legislature to stand in his way. But Reagan was only as good as the lines he was given to say and his
success was not simply about presentation. He surrounded himself with an able team to whom he freely
delegated. Unlike the Carter administration, Congressional liaison was placed in expert hands and his
loyal cabinet and the Office of Management and Budget saw their status and role increase. Even the First
Lady, Nancy Reagan, played an active role giving advice and looking for potential pitfalls for her husband’s
personal prestige. The administration was politically adroit and showed themselves to be experts at
maximising their success during Reagan’s first year in office. A key factor was speed. They acted quickly,
ESSAYS • 295
1111 emulating Roosevelt’s ‘Hundred Days’ and capitalising on Reagan’s personal popularity and his presumed
2111 mandate, although it was quite clear that a good proportion of his vote had been anti-Carter rather than
3 pro-Reagan. To cap it all, the President himself hobbled into Congress on crutches following his shooting,
4111 and it appeared that Capitol Hill had little choice but to accept his unambiguous flagship policies that had
5 been outlined during the election campaign to cut tax and reduce spending.
6 Reagan’s economic policies were arguably his most significant achievement. Like his British contem-
7 porary Margaret Thatcher, Reagan sought a different approach to running the economy after the inflation
8 and unemployment of the 1970s. Keynesian interventionist ideas were jettisoned in favour of the mone-
9 tarist principles of Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics. The idea was to set the economy
10111 free from government interference and reduce considerably the higher levels of taxation. Faced with
1 fewer constraints and higher rewards, private enterprises would become more productive and the posi-
2 tive effects of this would trickle down for the benefit of all. During the primary season George Bush (who
3 was to become his running mate) had labelled this theory ‘voodoo economics’. Today it is recalled as
4 ‘Reaganomics’, such is its identification with the Republican who instigated it.
5 The first of Reagan’s two major economic policies was the Omnibus Budget Reconstruction Act of
6 July 1981. It reduced government spending on social security, pensions and Medicare. The Economic
7 Recovery Tax Act passed in August reduced the highest rate of income tax from 70 per cent to 50 per cent,
8 cut capital gains tax from 28 per cent to 20 per cent as well as significantly reducing business taxes. They
9 represented bold victories for the administration, but unlike the heady days of the New Deal the momentum
20111 could not be sustained and the White House found it much harder to get its own way. In 1982 House
1 Democrats resisted social security cuts and in 1984 they rejected Reagan’s call to support rebels in Nicaragua.
2 The immediate effect of Reagan’s policies was to bring a deep recession in 1982 and taxes had to be
3 raised. But by the following year, the economy recovered strongly and life was good for the rich until the
4 stock market crash of 1987. Meanwhile for the less fortunate the welfare state had been scaled back, and
5 in the cities homelessness and drug use were on the increase. But despite the social repercussions, Reagan’s
6 political achievement has to be acknowledged. He had come to Washington with a set of unambiguous
7 policies and had overseen their swift enactment. For the first time since Nixon, he had shown that the
8 Presidency was once more an effective institution for putting forward policies.
9 Although federal programmes were downsized, spending on defence rocketed. Echoing Kennedy’s inau-
30 gural line, ‘Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate’, Reagan initiated an escalation
1 of the Cold War thus ending the détente of the 1970s. The Soviet Union simply could not match Amer-
2 ican spending and their spectacular economic and political collapse in the latter half of the decade duly
3 followed. This was due in part to Gorbachev’s reforms, but Reagan too must be given credit for, on the
4 one hand, forcing their economic collapse and, on the other, for his willingness to find common ground
5 with Gorbachev. It may have been inadvertent, but Reagan’s military build-up paradoxically helped bring
6 freedom and peace.
7 Reagan’s political skills should, however, be called into question. He may have projected the image of
8 an in-control visionary but behind the doors of the White House the reality was often quite different. Jimmy
9 Carter had devoured paperwork and would immerse himself in every last detail of his administration’s
40 business, but Ronald Reagan was cut from different cloth. The President was lightweight in certain respects
1 and those around him could always be counted on to move in to fill the void. Most notable of these
2 was Donald Regan, the Chief of Staff from 1985 to 1987. According to insiders he cut off access to the
3 President and called the shots himself (Doyle). Regan, the de facto ‘president’, was finally removed on
4 the advice of Nancy Reagan. Ultimately Ronald Reagan’s hands-off style and policy of delegation failed
45 him in the end. The Iran-Contra scandal brought Reagan’s White House into sharp focus and his Presidency
46 to a sombre end.
47 Memories of Watergate were reawakened with the revelation that agencies of the federal government
48 had acted illegally in pursuing what they considered to be the best interests of the United States. Weapons
49222 had been sold to Iran who in return would put pressure on hostage-takers in the Middle East. This flew
in the face of the policy of refusing to deal with terrorists. The money from the arms deals was diverted
to fund rebels in Nicaragua who were fighting their country’s communist government. Giving aid to the
Nicaraguan Contras broke laws that had been passed during Reagan’s first term. Once more, an adminis-
tration had demonstrated its disregard for Congress and the law, and in 1987 the Senate and House launched
an investigation that would undermine Reagan’s credibility.
The Iran-Contra hearings showed Reagan to be an ageing and forgetful President who was not in
control of his administration. If it is to be believed that he genuinely could not recall anything about the
secret deals that had been going on, then it showed his gross negligence in allowing a military officer to
steer part of American foreign policy. With a haughty Congress intent on enhancing its own ability to check
the Presidency and with the economy in trouble following a major fall in share prices in October 1987
(that became known as ‘Black Monday’), Reagan withdrew from his job. He spent his days in the residency
of the White House watching old films, depressed and seemingly disinterested in the affairs of state. There
was serious talk of replacing him with Vice-President Bush, but Reagan managed to gather himself to see
through his duties for the final year of his incumbency.
The flaws in Reagan’s style became all too evident but when taken en masse his approach to politics
must be considered a success. He oversaw the passing of his most important legislation and at the same
time managed to restore some of the glamour and prestige to the White House. But Iran-Contra brought
the administration back down to earth and Reagan’s powers faded fast. He had a torrid time getting his
nominations for the Supreme Court accepted by the Senate for example, but such was his popularity and
the faith he inspired that his personal reputation was not damaged to the degree it might have been. Reagan
led a charmed life as President; the mud refused to stick and it was not for nothing that he became known
as the ‘Teflon President’. Domestically he will be best remembered for his economic policies, which brought
growth at a social cost. And in the last instance, the massive federal debt incurred by cutting taxes and
increasing military spending must be questioned. Accordingly the most accurate sobriquet for Ronald
Reagan is not the ‘Great Communicator’ but rather the ‘Credit Card President’.
9 To what extent can ‘Reaganomics’ be described as a successful economic

programme? (20)
(AQA)
Essay plan
Introduction: Outline the economic situation that Reagan inherited and state what he had pledged to do
to improve the performance of the economy.
Para 1: Explain the theory behind supply-side economics and the personnel whom Reagan charged with
enacting his vision of a smaller government drawing attention to the President’s hands-off style.
Para 2: Assess Reagan’s tax-cutting measures: 25 per cent over next three years alone with the hope that
these cuts would pay for themselves as private investment grew. The relaxation of laws regulating
industry and protecting the environment was also intended to stimulate growth.
Para 3: Outline the reductions in federal government spending ($35 billion in 1982) and their social
impact.
Para 4: Describe the mid-1980s Reagan boom and his easy re-election in 1984. Can these be taken as signs
of success?
Para 5: Explain the staggering increase in the federal budget deficit and the impact of higher interest rates
and the increase in the value of the dollar.
Conclusion: A legislative triumph but an economic and social failure.
ESSAYS • 297
1111
2111 The domestic failure of George Bush
3
4111 10 Assess the problems that beset the Presidency of George Bush. (20)
5 (AQA)
6
7 With the retirement of Ronald Reagan, his deputy, George Herbert Walker Bush, was finally able to step
8 out of the shadows and become President in 1989. Bush was a former Director of the CIA and a noted
9 party loyalist since the days of Nixon. He was not the automatic choice of many on the right of the
10111 Republican Party as he was viewed as something of a moderate, but he managed to win the important
1 Primaries and the Republican nomination. Immediately Bush made a mistake that was to cause him embar-
2 rassment, and no doubt votes in 1992, by selecting a young senator from Indiana, Dan Quayle, to be his
3 running mate. Quayle made numerous gaffes, misspelling potato in front of television cameras and a class
4 of ten-year-olds, for example, and proved easy prey for the late night talk show hosts for the next four
5 years. Although Americans could jokingly dismiss him as Bush’s insurance policy against assassination, the
6 Quayle factor did have a marginal political impact in 1992 when the incumbent Vice-President was pitted
7 against the dour but infinitely more competent Al Gore.
8 In the largely negative Presidential campaign of 1988, Bush defeated the governor of Massachusetts,
9 Michael Dukakis. The governor had squandered a healthy lead over Bush, as a result of Republican attacks
20111 as well as his own lacklustre campaign. The results of the elections demonstrated that Bush could hardly
1 claim a convincing mandate from the people, a state of affairs compounded by the Congressional elections,
2 where the Democrats won healthy majorities. The style Bush adopted, once in the White House, was reac-
3 tive rather than proactive. He preferred to wait for Congress to act first and then use his power of veto
4 where he felt necessary.
5 The Presidency of George Bush will be remembered on balance as a failure, such is the stigma of being
6 a one-term President. This verdict is primarily due to domestic issues rather than foreign policy where he
7 oversaw two important successes. Accompanying the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and the
8 territories it had occupied for decades, the Cold War came to a sudden end. The Berlin Wall was literally
9 torn down overnight and central Europe was finally set free from Soviet subjugation. However, the dramatic
30 decline of a once formidable enemy did little for the man in the White House at the time. In an unchar-
1 acteristically humorous moment in 1992, Al Gore summed up the situation thus: ‘George Bush taking credit
2 for the end of the Cold War is like the cockerel taking credit for the sunrise.’
3 With one long-term enemy defeated, another duly arrived in August 1990 when Iraq invaded its oil-
4 rich neighbour Kuwait. Bush saw no other way out than to destroy Iraq’s military capabilities. A five-week
5 air campaign followed by a four-day ground war achieved this end. The conditional ceasefire that Bush
6 announced in February 1991 saw the President act in accordance with prevailing international opinion by
7 not interfering in internal Iraqi politics. Consequently Saddam Hussein remained both as Iraqi dictator
8 and a thorn in America’s side throughout the rest of the decade and beyond. Victory parades, the like of
9 had not been seen since the Second World War, were held in the United States that summer – but in reality
40 there was little to celebrate and Bush’s post-war popularity soon plummeted. With continuing problems
1 in the Middle East and the former Yugoslavia the world now appeared a more uncertain place to its only
2 remaining superpower. At least with the Soviets things had been predictable.
3 But foreign policy was not where the 1992 elections would be fought. The economic boom of the 1980s
4 had, unfortunately for Bush, come to an abrupt end. Unemployment rose and property values fell. The
45 recession that blighted the Bush Presidency hit the middle classes in particular and seriously undermined
46 his chances of re-election. In 1992 Bill Clinton would go out of his way to court this sector of the elec-
47 torate. One of the more memorable events in the 1988 elections had been Bush’s ‘Read my lips, no new
48 taxes’ promise to the American people. But within two years he had reneged on it, owing to the size of the
49222 federal budget deficit and the downturn in the economy. In October 1990 he signed a bill that raised sales
taxes on certain non-essential items and increased the highest level of income tax by 4 per cent. This volte-
face had the dual effect of offending a good proportion of the electorate as well as his own party and can
be considered a significant factor in his electoral defeat in 1992.
An indication of the domestic power of President Bush can be gained from controversies surrounding
certain appointments to federal positions. Difficulties with Presidential nominations were evident from the
start and were to dog him throughout his term. Bush nominated an old friend from Texas, former senator
John Tower, for the prominent cabinet position of Secretary of Defense. Unverifiable allegations of drinking
and womanising surfaced and, after a lengthy investigation, the Senate narrowly rejected the President’s
choice in March 1989. Bush believed that battering federal nominees had become a new sport in Washington
and sure enough worse was to come from Congress and the media.
In 1990 Bush nominated a quiet, pro-choice New Hampshire judge, David Souter, for a vacant seat
on the Supreme Court. As a 50-year-old bachelor the media considered him fair game and published alle-
gations concerning his sexuality. Souter found the pressure and scrutiny unbearable and very nearly
withdrew before the Senate finally and unequivocally confirmed him. The following year Bush nominated
a black conservative judge, Clarence Thomas, when another vacancy arose. Thomas narrowly survived the
spectacle of televised hearings over allegations of sexual harassment by a former colleague. Throughout
Bush acted commendably, sticking by his nominees but still these problems had the effect of diverting
attention and energy away from the real issues.
Outside Washington, President Bush’s most pressing problem was the economy. But more vivid and
divisive trouble was just around the corner. Racial tensions were brought into the spotlight in the worst
possible way in the spring of 1992 when an all-white jury acquitted four Los Angeles police officers who
had savagely beaten a black man, Rodney King. The unusual thing about the ‘King Trial’ was not the beating
but the existence of videotape of the incident. It had been played time and again on television and with
the evidence there for all to see it seemed incredible that the officers could escape unpunished. When the
verdict came, South Central Los Angeles erupted in violence and looting that continued for three days.
There were milder outpourings of indignation in several other cities across the US as well. Riots had not
occurred on American streets since the 1960s and they came as a real shock to the American people.
The year 1992 was election year, and the timely reminder of social problems that had long existed in
America could only harm the incumbent President. The campaign was going to be a hard battle for Bush
and it did not start well when he lost his Chief of Staff, John Sununu, in December 1991, following
media questioning about Sununu’s travel expenses. With his re-election campaign about to begin, Bush
felt that he could not afford to let one of his staff become an issue and so lost a trusted aide. The election
was fought on domestic issues – and Bush had excelled in foreign affairs while appearing to neglect
the problems facing millions of ordinary Americans. Faced with a charismatic Southern governor with an
appealing programme, Bush fought in vain for a second term, losing by a landslide in November 1992
to Bill Clinton.
George Bush was, above everything else, a party loyalist who had been rescued from obscurity by Nixon,
given his post at the CIA by Ford, before being selected by Reagan as deputy material after the Great
Communicator had defeated him in the Republican Primaries of 1980. Bob Woodward, for one, has argued
that Bush got where he was by playing by party rules and had not developed the necessary political skills
to handle the obligatory scandals and conflicts of the office he eventually held. These weaknesses played a
walk-on role in his election defeat but it was primarily his lack of a domestic agenda that cost him dear.
And one thing mattered above all others, as the Clinton/Gore campaign repeatedly reminded themselves:
‘It’s the economy, stupid.’
PRACTICE QUESTION
11 To what extent were Reagan and Bush’s domestic agendas different? (20)
(AQA)
ESSAYS • 299
1111
2111 Trends in the balance of power, 1960–1992
3
4111 12 Outline and explain the shifts in the balance of power within the federal government and
5 between the state and the people in America between the years 1960 to 1992. (20)
6 (AQA)
7
8 Relations between the executive and legislative branches of government in the US are quite different from
9 the British example. In America the President is in a weaker position than the typical British Prime Minister,
10111 especially on the delivery of his domestic programme. The roots of this situation lie in the system of checks
1 and balances that were integral to the Constitution of 1787. Essentially the Constitution holds a pessimistic
2 view of human nature and the nature of power and therefore it set out to limit the ability to exercise power.
3 The Founding Fathers devised two separations of powers in the United States that safeguard the nation
4 and its people from possible tyranny from the apparatus of state. First, power is divided horizontally between
5 the Presidency, the bicameral Congress and a Supreme Court, which swiftly assumed the power of judicial
6 review. Second, power is split in a more vertical fashion between the federal government and the govern-
7 ments of the 50 states.
8 Throughout the nineteenth century, Congress was firmly in the ascendancy over the Presidency. It is
9 interesting to note how people are frequently unable to recall the names of many Presidents of this era,
20111 other than that of Abraham Lincoln, who was President at a time when strong leadership was essential to
1 the future of the nation. Furthermore, the scope of the federal government itself and its ability to affect
2 the lives of the citizenry was quite limited. This can be seen as a contributing factor to the failure of
3 Reconstruction following the Civil War, for example. The Presidency finally became the chief source
4 of policy out of simple necessity during the Great Depression of the 1930s, and since this time Americans
5 have come to expect that the President will take the lead role in proposing legislation for the common
6 good. The scope of the government increased enormously under Franklin Roosevelt, as did the power of
7 the Presidency over Congress. Over the intervening decades the United States has witnessed a constant
8 shifting both in the powers of the Presidency and of Congress, and also in the degree of intervention in
9 their lives that the people expect from their national government.
30 The 1960s began with the promise of more government intervention. John F. Kennedy had pledged
1 that the federal government would tackle issues such as education and minority rights, although he made
2 only modest progress towards these goals. Following Kennedy’s assassination, Lyndon Johnson extended
3 the scope of Kennedy’s ideas in his Great Society programme that launched a war on poverty and saw the
4 federal government take responsibility in areas it had hitherto ignored. The Civil Rights Act and the exten-
5 sion of medical cover to the elderly and low-waged represent a level of intrusiveness from the state that
6 may be commonplace in Europe but has always lacked the same degree of consensus in the US.
7 The Presidency became imperial in manner under President Johnson with his Great Society and the
8 escalation of the conflict in Vietnam and in 1968 Americans opted for what they expected to be a more
9 restrained Presidency under Richard Nixon. However, his continued use of the military in Southeast Asia
40 and the subversion of state agencies for his own ends led to bitter disappointment. It seemed as if the
1 Presidency had become imperial in intent under President Nixon and following his downfall the balance
2 needed to be redressed. The people and Congress demanded a humbler executive and that is what they
3 received under Ford and Carter.
4 The 1970s saw Congress reassert its authority within the American political system to the detriment
45 of the powers of the Presidency. The passage of legislation such as the War Powers Act, which bordered
46 on unconstitutionality, enabled the legislature to check the President over diplomatic, military and
47 budgetary matters in a more comprehensive manner than before. Johnson’s Great Society had been on the
48 wane since the early 1970s, which perhaps reflected the will for a less interventionist state. But it was also
49222 hampered by a faltering economy because of the cost of Vietnam and the increase in oil prices. Ford and
Carter stopped the rot as far as the public’s perception of the Presidency, but it seemed that the balancing
act had worked too well and that the Presidency was now impotent. This was especially apparent in their
faltering attempts to steer the economy back on course.
By the late 1970s, fears concerning the ‘imperial Presidency’ were being replaced with worries about
the ‘post-imperial Presidency’. It appeared that the increasingly unhappy occupants of the White House
had too little power and could only look forward to being frustrated in their efforts by Congress, the
Supreme Court and the people. Anthony King has commented that during this period the public felt increas-
ingly let down by their political system and were concerned that the institution of the Presidency appeared
ineffectual and discredited.
There was a yearning for a successful Presidency after the years of turmoil and apparent failure. But
Ronald Reagan’s two terms in office cannot be considered especially successful, given his failed foreign poli-
cies in Lebanon and Nicaragua, the enormous public debt he left behind and the Iran-Contra scandal. In
reality the Reagan years were not so far away from the perceived failures of the 1960s and 1970s. However,
Reagan provided the people with what they needed: he was able to make Americans feel good about them-
selves and their nation. It was his manner that made him extremely popular rather than his policies and
it was unsurprising that he easily won re-election in 1984.
Reagan’s success was perceived rather than real. He oversaw a radical reduction in the scope of the
federal government as social policies were neglected in favour of tax cuts. Together with these reductions,
an enormous increase in defence expenditure saddled the nation with a horrific national debt. The intro-
duction of so-called ‘Reaganomics’ firmly reversed the trend of the recent past when Presidents had sought
to reduce the budget deficit. His successor, George Bush, promised a ‘kinder, gentler America’ but he too
was inactive on social issues, and furthermore the economy was in recession. By the early 1990s America
was ready to elect a candidate who promised to tackle issues at home, such as health care and the inner
cities that had been sidelined for the previous two decades.
It appeared as if the United States had come full circle, from the promises of the Great Society, through
the reduction of state intervention during the 1970s and 1980s, to a situation where the people were once
again looking for the government to intervene on their behalf in the 1990s. Is there any way of explaining
this cycle that America has been through? The work of Samuel Huntington can arguably shed light on the
uneasy relationship Americans have with their state. In The Promise of Disharmony, Huntington argues
that American politics is driven by a gap that exists between what is promised and what is actually delivered
by its institutions. He states that being American is not an ethnic or cultural matter, rather it is ideolog-
ical. The ‘American creed’ is captured in three pivotal documents: the Declaration of Independence, the
Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The ideas contained herein, such as freedom, individualism and equality,
form the basis of American nationality. These beliefs are united by the notion that limits should be imposed
on power and the institutions of government. In other words, Americans are inherently suspicious of ‘big’
government.
Needless to say, the country does not manage to live up to these lofty ideals and its institutions are
seen to fail in delivering what was promised. This ‘ideals versus institutions’ gap always exists but, from
time to time, when the gulf becomes too wide, it is no longer tolerated. Huntington claims that the United
States goes through a ‘credal cycle’. Put simply this means that, when the people see the gap between
promise and reality widening, they become more passionate about their system and demand that action
be taken. This could explain why every generation or so the American people are willing to accept a more
interventionist state. The New Deal of the 1930s, the Great Society of the 1960s and the election of Bill
Clinton in the 1990s, despite his personal weaknesses, provide persuasive evidence for this theory about
the workings of the governance of the United States.
1111
2111
3
4111 1 Extracts from Ronald Reagan’s speeches
5
6 Domestic policy from 1960 to 1992 is not currently examined using Sources. However, candidates should
7 find the following extracts and accompanying questions a worthwhile exercise.
8 ■ Source A: Extract from Reagan’s first inaugural address, January 1981
9
10111 For decades, we have piled deficit upon deficit, mortgaging our future and our children’s future for the
1 temporary convenience of the present. To continue this long trend is to guarantee tremendous social,
2 cultural, political, and economic upheavals. You and I, as individuals, can, by borrowing, live beyond our
3 means, but for only a limited period of time. Why, then, should we think that collectively, as a nation, we
4 are not bound by that same limitation?
5
■ Source B: Extract from Reagan’s first inaugural address, January 1981
6
7 It is my intention to curb the size and influence of the federal establishment and to demand recognition
8 of the distinction between the powers granted to the federal government and those reserved to the states
9 or to the people. All of us need to be reminded that the federal government did not create the states; the
20111 states created the federal government.
1
2 ■ Source C: Reagan’s second inaugural address, January 1985
3 Tax rates have been reduced, inflation cut dramatically, and more people are employed than ever before
4 in our history.
5
6 ■ Source D: President Reagan’s speech on the Challenger disaster, Oval Office of the White
7 House, 28 January 1986
8 The future doesn’t belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave . . . The crew of the space shuttle
9 Challenger honored us by the manner in which they lived their lives. We will never forget them, nor the
30 last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for the journey and waved goodbye and ‘slipped the
1 surly bonds of earth’ to ‘touch the face of God’.
2
3 1 Examine Sources A and B. What do they show about President Reagan’s intentions for his
4 first term in office?
5
6 Advice: To reduce the federal budget deficit and the degree of intrusion from the federal government.
7
2 Using Sources A, B and C and your own knowledge assess the success of Reagan’s
8
economic policies.
9
40 Advice: There was a long period of economic growth from 1983 onwards. As promised Reagan cut taxes and
1 government spending. However defence spending multiplied, which meant that his goal of reducing borrowing
2 failed. Furthermore during the economic boom the poorest people were hit by the reductions in spending.
3
3 Using all the Sources and your own knowledge assess why Reagan remained so popular
4
for so long.
45
46 Advice: Reagan owed much of his success to the presentation of his Presidency. He owes a debt to speech-writer
47 Peggy Noonan as well as to the numerous films and other sources (e.g. the poem ‘High Flight’ by John Magee
48 was used in his Challenger address) from which they took lines and anecdotes, often without crediting them or
49222 making clear that they were fictional.
2 Research questions on domestic issues, 1960–1992
The Internet has become a useful research tool for History students but it should be realised that simply
downloading relevant pages is of little benefit. It is necessary to actually do something with the vast amount
of information available to you in order to facilitate your understanding. This exercise is intended to develop
your ability to collate and condense information from a number of sources as well as extend your under-
standing of US domestic policy from 1960 to 1992.
Using search engines visit relevant sites to find out what you can about the following issues or events and
produce a ten-line summary of each unless otherwise stated:
1 The 1960 Presidential elections including the Kennedy–Nixon debates and the role of JFK’s father.
2 The 1964 tax cut.
3 Bobby Kennedy’s final speech (Los Angeles 1968). Why did he criticise LBJ?
4 The various groups that demonstrated or rioted in the Johnson and Nixon years. Is Nixon’s opinion
that the nation was under threat from within understandable or a sign of paranoia?
5 The role of the media in taming the imperial Presidency.
6 The presentation of President Carter to the public and Congress. Under what name was he inaugu-
rated?
7 The Iran-Contra scandal.
8 The messages of the 1992 Clinton–Gore campaign.
9 Produce a table to illustrate control of the House of Representatives, the Senate and the White House
from 1960. Shade the Democrats and the Republicans in different colours. How often has one party
been in control of all three institutions?
10 Produce graphs to illustrate trends in the following:
(a) unemployment;
(b) inflation;
(c) the federal budget deficit.
G.H. Bennett, The American Presidency, 1945–2000, Sutton Edmund Ions, The Politics of John F. Kennedy, Routledge
Publishing (2000). and Kegan Paul (1967).
Irving Bernstein, Guns or Butter: The Presidency of Lyndon Doris Kearns, Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream,
Johnson, Oxford University Press (1996). Andre Deutsch (1976).
Hugh Brogan, Kennedy, Longman (1996). Anthony King (ed.), The New American Political System,
Jimmy Carter, Keeping Faith: Memoirs of a President, 2nd edition, AEI (1990).
Collins (1982). Jane Mayer and Doyle McManus, Landslide: The Un-
Roger Davidson and Walter Oleszek, Congress and making of the President, 1984–1988, Collins (1988).
its Members, 8th edition, Congressional Quarterly Anthony Summers, The Arrogance of Power: The Secret
(2002). World of Richard Nixon, Victor Gollancz (2000).
William Doyle, Inside the Oval Office, London House Mark White (ed.), Kennedy: The New Frontier Revisited,
(1999). Macmillan (1998).
Jim Heath, John F. Kennedy and the Business Community, Bob Woodward, Shadow: Five Presidents and the Legacy of
University of Chicago Press (1969). Watergate, Simon & Schuster (1999).
Samuel Huntington, American Politics: The Promise of
Disharmony, Harvard University Press (1981).
1111
2111
3
4111 Chapter 12
5
6
7
8
9
10111
General Conclusion:
1
2
From AS to A2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
20111 The purpose of this book has been to prepare for essays and examinations at AS and A-level. Some of
1 the topics studied and all of the historical skills acquired at AS lead naturally and logically to the next
2 conceptual stage represented by A2. This includes two approaches which are rooted in AS but grow beyond
3 it. One is Historical Interpretation, with an emphasis on historiography or the study of different historical
4 viewpoints. The other is a Synoptic Study of a period of about 100 years. These are common to all the
5 Examination Boards.
6
7
8
AS to A2: Historical Interpretation
9 An example of the approach to Historical Interpretation at A2 can be seen in the OCR Specifications for
30 the paper entitled Historical Investigations.
1
2 Investigations are built around topics of current interests to historians and the specific aim is to develop
3 an understanding of how the past has been interpreted and represented, and how historical research
4 generates controversies over interpretation. Candidates are expected to understand the principal argu-
5 ments surrounding their chosen topic and to be able to offer their own explanations and interpretations.
6 Extract from OCR Specifications for A2 History: Historical Investigations
7
8 One dimension of this has
The AS approach to Historical Interpretation
9 already been extensively
40 covered. All AS students are
1 familiar with at least one HISTORICAL ISSUE
2 historical issue which is in-
3 herently controversial. They
4 know how to interpret this
45 issue in response to a specific
46 question about it, making
47 selective and creative use of
48 the factual material relating to interpreted through critical
and creative use of HISTORICAL EVIDENCE
49222 the topic.
304 • GENERAL CONCLUSION: FROM AS TO A2
This has been the whole point of answering questions which begin with ‘Why . . . ? ’, ‘How far . . . ?’, ‘To
what extent . . . ?’, ‘Assess the reasons for . . .’ and many others. Use has been made of evidence from the
period (factual knowledge) to consider possible reasons, to explain how these fit together and to weigh up
which are the most valid.
This is the starting point for the A2 approach, which adds the extra dimension of assessing other views
which have been put forward by different historians and groups of historians (who are part of ‘schools of
thought’). At A2 students have to be aware of the real controversy behind the issue as well as the possible
interpretations which will have occurred to them at AS. Historiography is therefore added to History. But
the whole process still has to take account of the historical evidence. Historiography does not replace History
– it provides additional perspectives and further opportunities for creative and original thought.
The A2 approach to Historical Interpretation
HISTORICAL ISSUE
interpreted through about

critical reference to
DIFFERENT VIEWPOINTS HISTORICAL EVIDENCE
advanced by analysed creatively

through use of
DIFFERENT HISTORIANS AND

SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT
To give a practical example, an AS task might involve assessing how successful Roosevelt’s ‘New Deal’
was. At A2 the emphasis would be more on explaining why there are major differences between historians
over whether the New Deal was a success or not.
AS to A2: Synoptic Study

‘Synoptic’ in the context of A2 History has two possible meanings. The first is the connection between some
of the different topics covered at AS and A2 to create a broader perspective on another paper; this is required
by some specifications but not by others. The second is an approach within an A2 paper (whether or not
it involves areas previously studied) which requires an analysis of the broad sweep of change over a period
of approximately 100 years. The OCR Specifications, for example, refer to the Synoptic Study as Themes
in History, which:
GENERAL CONCLUSION: FROM AS TO A2 • 305
1111 develop understanding of connections between different elements of the subject. They draw together
2111 knowledge, understanding and the values of diverse issues centred on Key Themes. The topics are
3 based on Key Themes covering an extended period of approximately a hundred years with an emphasis
4111 on continuity and change within the topic. The emphasis is on developing a broad overview of the period
5 studied. They are historical perspectives modules, so concern is centred on links and comparison
6 between different aspects of the topics studied.
7 Extract from OCR Specifications for A2 History: Themes in History
8
9 As with the Historical Interpretation, the skills developed at AS lead to those needed at AS. This time, the
10111 change concerns the way in which perspectives are viewed. At AS the approach was to analyse a specific
1 topic in a broad sweep (for example, the motives for writing the Constitution). At A2 the perspective is
2 considerably extended, but the topic becomes much more selective (for example, assess the long-term
3 impact of the Constitution on the outbreak of the American Civil War). The contrasting approaches can
4 be seen as an open pair of scissors.
5
6 The A2 Synoptic approach and how it compares to AS
7
8
approach
9
20111
A2
1
2
3
4
selected criteria, in a synoptic framework
Specific coverage of a broad period, based on
AS Broad coverage of a specific topic,

5 based on selected criteria,
approach
6 in a chronological framework
7
8
9
30
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8 Coverage at A2 is based on ‘themes’, some of which cover the whole period; an example of a ‘theme’
9 might be ‘The struggle for the Constitution, 1763–1877’. It also takes in comparisons – possibly between
40 individuals and certainly between periods, for example between the leaders of African American civil rights
1 movements. A2 coverage of this subject matter is less likely to be chronological than at AS: different periods
2 are considered quickly and without necessarily looking at the connecting phases. Even this, however, will
3 not be completely unexpected, since any AS essay depending strictly on chronology always runs the risk
4 of narrative.
45
46
47 The Synoptic Study is so complex that it really needs a specific example of how it works and how it builds
48111 on the AS approach. Here are the stages by which an answer to a typical A2 question might be
49222 built up.
306 • GENERAL CONCLUSION: FROM AS TO A2
The first preparatory stage is to identify the significance of the parameters set by the question and to
subdivide the two time periods into more manageable chunks which will allow more analysis.
Stage 1: A2 essay identifying the periods for coverage

To what extent did African Americans make more progress between 1877 and 1919 than between
1919 and 1980?
1877 (end of
reconstruction)
1919
(race riots in
‘Red Summer’)
1945
(end of Second
World War)
1960
(SNCC launched
and CORE revived)
1980
(election of Reagan)
Stage 2: A2 essay identifying the periods for coverage

How far did African Americans make more progress between 1877 and 1919 than between
1919 and 1980?
CRITERIA:
SOCIAL ECONOMIC POLITICAL CULTURAL
1877 (end of
reconstruction)
1919
(race riots in
‘Red Summer’)
1945
(end of Second
World War)
1960
(SNCC launched
and CORE revived)
1980
(election of Reagan)
GENERAL CONCLUSION: FROM AS TO A2 • 307
1111 The second stage (see Stage 2, p. 306) is to select three or four key criteria for assessing the progress
2111 of African Americans between 1877 and 1980. These should be distinctive and examples should be drawn
3 – overall – from the full time span 1877–1980. The themes selected should be fairly clear from the subject
4111 specification.
5 In terms of technique – if not of content – this could still be an AS essay. Many students would tend
6 to use the criteria by working chronologically through the leaders. What would convert this into a full A2
7 approach is a direct comparison between them acting as the basic structure of the essay (see Stage 3).
8 Although this may sound complex, it is actually using a skill already acquired at AS – but notching it up
9 to a more demanding A2 approach.
10111
1 Stage 3: A2 essay making comparisons through the whole period, using the criteria
2
3 CRITERIA:
4
5
6 SOCIAL ECONOMIC POLITICAL CULTURAL
7
8
1877 (end of
9 reconstruction)
20111
1
2
3 1919
4 (race riots in
‘Red Summer’)
5
compare compare compare compare
6 1945
7 (end of Second
World War)
8
9 1960
30 (SNCC launched
and CORE revived)
1
2 1980
3 (election of Reagan)
4
5
6 The transition from AS to A2 is therefore entirely logical. In a sense, it represents the two main dimen-
7 sions of History – the study of the past and an enquiry into methods used for that study.
8
9
40
1
2
3
4
45
46
47
48
49222
Biographies of Important Personalities
Dean Acheson (1893–1971)

Dean Acheson was a Law graduate who worked his way up to the position of Secretary of State, and took
a hard line on foreign policy, advocating intervention in Korea in 1950.
John Adams (1735–1826)

John Adams was born in Massachusetts, the son of a farmer. Having studied at Harvard, he became a
lawyer and went on to lead the opposition to the Stamp Act in 1765. In 1774 he was a delegate to the First
Continental Congress, and played a major role in the debates leading up to the signing of the Declaration
of Independence. Having served the new Republic in France, Holland and England, in 1789 he became
Vice-President of the United States to George Washington. In 1796 he was chosen as President, but following
dissensions within the Federalist Party he was not re-elected in 1800.
John Quincy Adams (1767–1848)

John Quincy Adams, the 6th President of the US, was the son of the second President. He was groomed
for high office at an early age, becoming Private Secretary to the American Envoy in St Petersburg at the
age of 14. He went on to serve in a number of government posts, such as Secretary of State during which
time he negotiated the treaty with Spain by which Florida was acquired. Some have suggested he was the
real writer of the ‘Monroe Doctrine’. In 1825 he was elected President by the House of Representatives,
but failed to be elected on his second attempt. He continued to serve as a congressman until his death and
became a notable opponent of slavery.
Louis Armstrong (1900–1971)

Louis Armstrong was a jazz trumpeter and singer who is regarded as one of the greatest jazz artists of all
time.
John Brown (1800–1859)

John Brown married twice and had 20 children, most of whom he used as a private army in his crusade
against slavery. He became involved in ‘Bleeding Kansas’ and was responsible for the murder of five pro-
slavers in the ‘Pottawatomie Massacre’. He gained greater notoriety with his 1859 raid on the Harper’s
Ferry armoury in Virginia from where he hoped to seize weapons with which he would spark a slave rebel-
lion. Marines under Robert E. Lee captured Brown who then stood trial and defended himself eloquently
and courageously before being sentenced to death and hanged.
William Jennings Bryan (1860–1925)

William Jennings Bryan went into politics after practising law, and was elected to Congress in 1890. He
stood unsuccessfully as Democrat Presidential candidate in 1896 and 1900, and 1908. He was made
Secretary of State by Woodrow Wilson but resigned during the First World War. He is perhaps best remem-
bered for his ‘Cross of Gold’ speech and his prosecution of John Scopes in the Tennessee ‘Monkey Trial’
of 1925.
BIOGRAPHIES • 309
1111 James Buchanan (1791–1868)

2111 James Buchanan, the fifteenth and possibly worst President of the United States, was the son of an immi-
3 grant Irish farmer. Prior to his election as President in 1856 he had been out of the country for some time,
4111 and seemed ill-equipped to deal with the rising tensions over the slavery question, particularly regarding
5 ‘Bleeding Kansas’. His pro-Southern sympathies exacerbated the situation and he remained strangely inac-
6 tive as Southern states seceded and war became increasingly likely.
7
8 George Bush (1924– )
9 George Bush was the 41st President of the US between 1989 and 1993. He enjoyed more success abroad
10111 than at home, with the expulsion of the Iraqi forces from Kuwait, and the formal ending of the Cold War.
1 Domestically he had promised a ‘kinder, gentler America’ but the combination of rising unemployment, a
2 tax rise and rioting in Los Angeles put paid to his chances of re-election in 1992.
3
4
James Byrnes (1879–1972)
5
6 James Byrnes was a former South Carolina senator and Supreme Court justice. As Secretary of State he had
7 a conciliatory reputation and sought friendship with the USSR in 1945.
8
9 John C. Calhoun (1782–1850)
20111 John Calhoun was born in South Carolina. He became Vice-President under John Quincy Adams and
1 served in the same position under Jackson until he decided that he should resign in 1832 so that he could
2 champion states’ rights in the Senate with his great oratory. In 1829 he stated anonymously that a state
3 had the right to nullify a federal law it regarded as unconstitutional. Despite annexing Texas as Secretary
4 of State in 1844 and supporting the interests of the slave states, he opposed the war with Mexico in 1846.
5
6 Al Capone (1899–1947)
7 Alphonse Capone achieved notoriety as a gangster during the 1920s in Chicago. He based his empire on
8 supplying alcohol during Prohibition, but was finally sent to prison in 1931 for tax evasion.
9
30
Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919)
1
Andrew Carnegie emigrated to America in 1848 with his family from Scotland. He personified the ‘rags to
2
riches’ dream starting as a factory worker before the Civil War and then investing his savings eventually in
3
iron and steel. Having made a fortune, Carnegie then began to give much of it away. It is estimated that
4
he donated about $70 million mainly to educational projects.
5
6
7 Jimmy Carter (1924– )
8 Jimmy Carter was the 39th President of the US between 1977 and 1981. In the aftermath of Watergate and
9 Vietnam, Carter represented a more low-key and humble Presidency and managed to restore the faith of
40 the nation in the executive office. He achieved a moderate amount of success in foreign affairs before being
1 voted out of office after one term following a rise in oil prices and an ongoing hostage situation in Iran
2 involving US diplomats.
3
4 Henry Clay (1777–1852)
45 Henry Clay was a statesman of great stature, entering the House of Representatives in 1811, and serving
46 as its speaker for many years. He played a significant role in bringing about the war of 1812 with Britain
47 and also in ending it. Following his involvement in the Missouri Compromise of 1820, he won the title of
48 ‘the great pacificator’. He unsuccessfully contested the Presidency in 1824, 1831 and 1844, and was largely
49222 behind the Compromise of 1850.
310 • BIOGRAPHIES
Grover Cleveland (1837–1908)

Stephen Grover Cleveland served as the 22nd and 24th President of the United States. In 1895 he applied
the ‘Monroe Doctrine’ to the area that is present-day Guyana.
Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)

John Calvin Coolidge became the 30th President of the US in 1923 on Harding’s death and served until
1929. His policies contributed to the Wall Street crash of 1929.
George Armstrong Custer (1839–1876)

General George Armstrong Custer, having graduated bottom in his class from West Point, went on to serve
with distinction for the North in the Civil War, but has gone down in history as the headstrong, glory-
seeking leader of the Seventh Cavalry whose command was wiped out in 1876 at the Battle of the Little
Big Horn by a Sioux-Cheyenne force under Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse.
Clarence Darrow (1857–1938)

Clarence Darrow was a lawyer who defended socialist leader Eugene Debs following a strike by the American
Railway Union, and was perhaps best known for his defence of John Scopes in the Tennessee ‘Monkey
Trial’ of 1925.
Jefferson Davis (1808–1889)

Jefferson Davis became the only President of the Confederate States of America in 1861. Having served in
the Mexican War, as a senator and as Secretary of War he appeared to be the best choice to lead the South,
although he accepted the position of President reluctantly. He was put in prison for two years after the war
but was never tried for treason.
Eugene Debs (1855–1926)

Eugene Debs, having been President of the American Railroad Union stood as a socialist candidate for the
Presidency in 1904, 1908, 1912 and 1920, and was imprisoned between 1918 and 1921 for his outspoken
pacifism.
Stephen Douglas (1813–1861)

Stephen Douglas, having been a Supreme Court judge, congressman and senator at various times, played
as great a part as any individual in heightening sectional animosities in the 1850s, largely because of his
failure to appreciate the extent of Northern anti-slavery feeling. Ironically he was not a sectional politician
himself, but believed that the issue of slavery could be resolved by the settlers of a territory voting on
whether slavery should exist or not. This alienated the North and also split his own Democrat Party making
his chances of being elected President in 1860 very slim.
Frederick Douglass (1817–1895)

Frederick Douglass, having escaped from slavery and bought his freedom using money collected for him
in Britain, became a leading figure in the abolitionist movement before the Civil War. His autobiography,
first published in 1845 was an eloquent and influential book, and as well as becoming the first great leader
of African Americans, he went on to be US Minister to Haiti in 1889.
W.E.B. Du Bois (1868–1963)

William Du Bois was a civil rights activist who was a founder member of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People. He also wrote several books on the subject of civil rights.
BIOGRAPHIES • 311
1111 John Foster Dulles (1888–1959)

2111 John Foster Dulles as Secretary of State became notorious for using such phrases as ‘massive retaliation’,
3 and felt that ‘containment’ was not an adequate policy, promoting ‘brinkmanship’ and liberation instead.
4111
5 ‘Duke’ Ellington (1899–1974)
6 ‘Duke’ Ellington was a composer, conductor and pianist who is one of the most highly regarded jazz musi-
7 cians of the twentieth century.
8
9 Gerald Ford (1913– )
10111 Gerald Ford was the 38th President of the US. He was the Republican leader in the House of Representatives
1 chosen to replace the disgraced Vice-President Spiro Agnew. Less than a year later he became President
2 following Nixon’s resignation. Ford is commonly considered to have been a caretaker President whose
3 period in the Oval Office was undermined both by his pardoning of Nixon and also the fact that he was
4 not elected to national office.
5
6 Henry Ford (1863–1947)
7 In 1899 Henry Ford founded his first motor car company in Detroit, and in 1903 set up the Ford Motor
8 Company. He pioneered mass production and the ‘assembly line’ approach to manufacturing and by 1928
9 had turned out 15 million of his model T cars, helping to transform the habits of a nation by bringing cars
20111 within the price range of many ordinary workers. As a lifelong pacifist, he later clashed with F.D. Roosevelt
1 over the use of the company for war production.
2
3
William Lloyd Garrison (1805–1879)
4
William Lloyd Garrison became one of the most famous opponents of slavery in the build-up to the Civil
5
War. In 1831 he started production of an abolitionist newspaper The Liberator, and also set up the American
6
Anti-Slavery Society.
7
8
Geronimo (1829–1909)
9
Geronimo, whose Indian name was Goyathlay, was an Apache leader who led resistance against the US
30
government’s policy of putting his people on reservations, until he surrendered in 1886 with the promise
1
that he would be allowed to go back to Arizona.
2
3
Samuel Gompers (1850–1924)
4
5 Samuel Gompers was one of the most important labour leaders to emerge in the late nineteenth century,
6 and set up the American Federation of Labor of which he was President.
7
8 Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885)
9 Ulysses Grant was given overall command of Union forces in March 1864 and used it to good effect. His
40 popularity after the war allowed him to become President of the US after the elections of 1868 and again
1 in 1872, overseeing the period of Reconstruction, but making some bad appointments, which led to his
2 administrations being tainted by scandal and corruption.
3
4 Alexander Hamilton (1757–1804)
45 Alexander Hamilton having fought with distinction during the War of Independence was returned to
46 Congress, and then played a leading role in the Annapolis Convention, which led to the Philadelphia
47 Convention the following year. He was behind the Federalist Papers which argued the case for the ratifi-
48 cation of the Constitution. He became Secretary of the Treasury in 1789 but died following a duel with his
49222 rival Aaron Burr.
312 • BIOGRAPHIES
Warren Harding (1865–1923)

Warren Harding was the 29th President of the US. His death was possibly hastened by the scandals linked
to the so-called ‘Ohio Gang’ of cronies he had appointed to various offices.
Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)

Benjamin Harrison was active and ambitious in foreign policy, pursuing expansion in the Pacific, devel-
oping the US navy and improving trade links with Central and South America.
Rutherford Hayes (1822–1893)

Rutherford Hayes was the 19th President of the US. Having reached the rank of Major General during the
Civil War, he was returned to Congress by Ohio, and, following the disputed election of 1876, a
Congressional commission awarded him the Presidency. He effectively ended Reconstruction by with-
drawing troops from the South in 1877.
Joseph Hooker (1814–1879)

‘Fighting Joe’ Hooker served in the Mexican War and became commander of the army of the Potomac in
1863. He was defeated by Lee at Chancellorsville and although replaced by Meade, he went on to march
with Sherman through Georgia, and served until Atlanta fell.
Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)

Herbert Hoover was the 31st President of the US and one of the least popular by the end of his term in
office. He had the misfortune to be in charge during the Wall Street crash and beginnings of the Great
Depression. Despite being the most able of the Republican Presidents of the 1920s he remained uncon-
vinced that the answer to economic problems lay in massive government intervention, so people never felt
he had done enough.
Langston Hughes (1902–1967)

Langston Hughes was a writer who highlighted social injustice and the frustrations of African Americans
through his articles, short stories and poems.
Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)

Andrew ‘Old Hickory’ Jackson was the 7th President of the US. Having served as a congressman and senator
for Tennessee he became a Major General in the army before returning to politics and eventually being
elected President in 1828. He has become associated with the concept of rewarding his supporters with the
spoils of office and ushering in the era of the common man, but in reality Presidents before Jackson had
also rewarded their supporters and ‘Jacksonian Democracy’ was an extremely limited type, which in the
main extended only to white males. He opposed the US Bank and also stood up to South Carolina when
the state threatened to secede.
Jesse Jackson (1941– )

Jesse Jackson is a civil rights activist who campaigned for the nomination to become the Democratic candi-
date for the Presidency in 1983/4.
‘Stonewall’ Jackson (1824–1863)

Thomas Jackson’s stand at the First Battle of Bull Run in 1861 earned him the nickname ‘Stonewall’. His
Shenandoah valley campaign of 1862 against superior Union forces earned him great admiration, but he
died after sustaining wounds inflicted by his own side at Chancellorsville in May 1863. Lee remained
convinced that had Jackson been at Gettysburg he would have beaten Northern forces, and turned the tide
of war.
BIOGRAPHIES • 313
1111 Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)

2111 Thomas Jefferson became the third President of the US in 1801 having already had an illustrious career in
3 many respects. He was a delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774, and went on to draft the
4111 Declaration of Independence. He served in Washington’s cabinet as Secretary of State despite effectively
5 being head of the emerging Republican Party, which opposed the Federalists who dominated cabinet.
6
7 Andrew Johnson (1808–1875)
8 Andrew Johnson was the 17th President of the US and, according to a recent poll of American History
9 professors, the second worst. Despite coming from Tennessee he regarded secession as treason and remained
10111 loyal to the Union. Following Lincoln’s assassination in 1865 he took over as President and soon found
1 himself at loggerheads with Congress over the course Reconstruction should take. His reluctance to see the
2 point of view of Congress resulted in his impeachment, although he narrowly avoided a guilty verdict.
3
4 Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)
5 Lyndon Johnson was the 36th President of the US. Taking over after Kennedy’s assassination in November
6 1963, he aimed to build a Great Society, which would see basic health care cover and an end to discrimi-
7 nation. The financial and human cost of American involvement in Vietnam on both Johnson and his
8 reforms took their toll and he chose not to run again for the Presidency in 1968.
9
20111 Joseph Johnston (1807–1891)
1 Joseph Johnston has been called the finest general the Confederacy had by some, but his talents were not
2 appreciated by Jefferson Davis who blamed him for the fall of Vicksburg in 1863, and relieved him of his
3 command in 1864. Having been recalled, he surrendered to Sherman in 1865.
4
5 John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917–1963)
6 JFK was the 35th President of the US and the first one to be born in the twentieth century. He was arguably
7 the first ‘modern’ President in terms of the glamour he brought to the post. An ill-advised decision to back
8 the overthrow of Castro in Cuba in 1961 ended in embarrassment and made him seem naive in the eyes
9 of the Soviet Union, an event which helped propel the superpowers towards stand-offs over Berlin and
30 Cuba. Kennedy found it difficult to make headway on his domestic agenda due in part to the entrenched
1 power of Southern conservative Democrats in Congress.
2
3 Martin Luther King (1929–1968)
4 Martin Luther King was a pastor and civil rights leader. He was a powerful orator who urged reform through
5 non-violent protest.
6
7 Robert M. La Follette (1855–1925)
8 Under the leadership of Robert La Follette the state of Wisconsin became known as the ‘laboratory of
9 democracy’ because of the experiments carried out in government. La Follette was a Progressive politician
40 who stood unsuccessfully for the Presidency in 1924, but won nearly five million votes.
1
2 Robert E. Lee (1807–1870)
3 Robert E. Lee is generally regarded as the finest military leader of the Civil War. Despite beginning his mili-
4 tary career as an engineer, having been appointed commander of Confederate forces in Virginia he gradually
45 made a name for himself in a series of successful battles against superior Northern forces.
46
47 Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
48 Abraham Lincoln became the 16th President of the US in 1861 having come to national prominence in
49222 1858 during a series of debates with Stephen Douglas in the Senate election campaign. His electoral victory
314 • BIOGRAPHIES
for the Republican Party triggered the secession of the Southern states, and his determination to preserve
the Union ensured that a Civil War would be fought. He eventually found the right combination of mili-
tary leaders to win the war, but the chance of winning the peace was to be denied him by the bullet of
assassin John Wilkes Booth, only days after Lee’s surrender.
John Locke (1632–1704)

English philosopher John Locke’s ‘Treatises on Government’ of 1689 argued that a government could be
deposed if it offended against natural law, and talked of fundamental rights being ‘life, liberty and estate’
(i.e. property).
Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964)

Douglas MacArthur served in both world wars and commanded the campaign to defeat Japan during the
period 1941–5. He went on to enjoy further success in South Korea in 1950.
James Madison (1751–1836)

James Madison became the 4th President of the US, having served in the Philadelphia Convention and
become known as ‘the father of the Constitution’. He co-wrote with Jay and Hamilton ‘the Federalist
Papers’, but went on to support Jefferson’s Republican Party when he became concerned about the power
of central government.
George Marshall (1880–1959)

George Marshall was a US General and former army chief of staff who was seen as a more hardline Secretary
of State than Byrnes. He is most famous for his Marshall Plan of 1947 that gave shape to US containment
policy in Europe, and his role in the formation of NATO.
John Marshall (1755–1835)

John Marshall became Chief Justice of the US in 1801 following spells in the army and Congress and as
Secretary of State. He played a seminal role in determining the position of the Supreme Court in the consti-
tutional system.
Joseph McCarthy (1909–1957)

Joseph McCarthy served as a Republican senator for Wisconsin between 1947 and 1957, during which time
he picked up on the issue of communist infiltration and subversion of US government. He intensified his
accusations of US leaders including Marshall and Acheson and helped to generate hysterical ‘witch-hunts’
across the US. He was eventually censured by the Senate in 1954.
George McClellan (1826–1885)

In November 1861 George McClellan was made commander-in-chief of Northern forces, but was quickly
replaced by Lincoln who believed that he showed far too much caution in prosecuting the war during his
Peninsula campaign in Virginia, and in following up Confederate forces after Antietam. McClellan went
on to run against Lincoln for the Presidency in the 1864 elections.
William McKinley (1843–1901)

William McKinley continued the more aggressive foreign policy of his two predecessors and led the US
into its first war with a European power (the Spanish-American War of 1898) since 1812. He was re-elected
but then assassinated.
George Meade (1815–1872)

George Meade served in the army against the Seminoles and the Mexicans before distinguishing himself in
the Civil War by defeating Lee at Gettysburg.
BIOGRAPHIES • 315
1111 Andrew Mellon (1855–1937)

2111 Andrew Mellon used a huge fortune from his father to become a banker and businessman before going
3 into politics and serving as Secretary of The Treasury from 1921.
4111
5 John Mitchell (1870–1919)
6 John Mitchell was a self-educated miner who became President of the United Mine Workers Union in
7 1898. In 1902 he was particularly successful in uniting diverse immigrant workers to strike.
8
9 James Monroe (1758–1831)
10111 James Monroe was the 5th President of the US. He opposed the Federalist interpretation of the Constitution,
1 and was elected President in 1816, going on to serve a second term. He is perhaps best known for his
2 ‘Monroe Doctrine’.
3
4 J.P. Morgan (1837–1913)
5 J.P. Morgan turned his father’s company into the most powerful private banking house in the US and set
6 up the US Steel Corporation in 1901. He controlled the railways and many other business interests.
7
8 Richard Nixon (1913–1994)
9 Richard Nixon was the 37th President of the US, and one of the most controversial figures to occupy the
20111 White House. He presided over the American withdrawal from Vietnam and a thawing in the Cold War.
1 However these achievements were overshadowed by rising domestic discontent and his eventual resigna-
2 tion in 1974 after the revelation of wrongdoings by his administration.
3
4 Thomas Paine (1737–1809)
5 Thomas Paine was an English radical who helped to inspire American independence with his pamphlet
6 ‘Common Sense’ published in 1776. He went on to serve with the American army as well as becoming a
7 deputy in the French National Convention following the revolution before returning to America.
8
Mitchell Palmer (1872–1936)
9
Alexander Mitchell Palmer, having been something of a Democrat Progressive who supported trade union
30
and women’s rights, changed his tune once appointed as Attorney-General. Convinced that communists
1
were plotting to overthrow the government he embarked on a campaign against left-wing groups. Some
2
have argued that he devised ‘the Red Scare’ to help his campaign to become President in 1920.
3
4 Rosa Parks (1914– )
5 Rosa Parks’ refusal to give up her seat for a white man on a bus in Alabama sparked off the Montgomery
6 Bus Boycott.
7
8 Terence Powderly (1849–1924)
9 Terence Powderly became the leader of the trade union the Knights of Labor in 1879, and pursued a policy
40 of trying to work constructively with employers.
1
2 A. Philip Randolph (1889–1979)
3 A. Philip Randolph was founder of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, an all-black union, who later
4 became President of the National Negro Congress. His idea for a march on Washington was taken up by
45 Martin Luther King and others in 1963.
46
47 Ronald Reagan (1911–2004)
48 Ronald Reagan was the 40th President of the US. The former actor became governor of California in 1967
49222 before unseating Jimmy Carter in 1980. He is best remembered as the ‘Great Communicator’ due to his
316 • BIOGRAPHIES
ease and charm with the people and the media. Declaring government the problem rather than the solu-
tion to the nation’s economic woes, he pushed through significant cuts in taxation and welfare spending.
His foreign policy included a highly questionable invasion of Grenada and the illegal arming of Nicaraguan
rebels as well as a renewal of the arms race with the Soviet Union.
Jacob Riis (1849–1914)

Jacob Riis became a police reporter for the New York Tribune and went on to publish his book How the
Other Half Lives in 1890. The photographic images in the book, which portrayed the living conditions of
the poor, prompted Theodore Roosevelt, then New York Police Commissioner, to close down police lodging
houses in the city.
J.D. Rockefeller (1839–1937)

John D. Rockefeller established Standard Oil with his brother and ended up giving away over $500 million
to various ‘good causes’.
Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)

Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected 32nd President of the US in 1932, defeating Herbert Hoover by promising
a New Deal to solve the Depression and also to repeal Prohibition. He won four elections and became
America’s longest-serving President. During the New Deal the scope and power of the state was extended
and moderate success was achieved but it took the war to finally bring the US out of the Depression.
Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919)

Theodore Roosevelt was the 26th President of the US. Having commanded his ‘Rough Riders’ during the
Spanish-American War, he held the office of governor of New York state, before taking over as President
when McKinley was assassinated. He was elected in his own right in 1904, regretted his decision to stand
down in 1908, and fought the 1912 election unsuccessfully as a Progressive candidate.
Bayard Rustin (1910–1987)

Bayard Rustin was adviser to Martin Luther King. His homosexuality, links with communism and consci-
entious objection during the Second World War ensured that he always remained a background figure.
Nicola Sacco (1891–1927)

In 1920 Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were accused of robbery and murder. They were found
guilty and executed seven years later. The judge in the case showed clear bias against the men throughout
on account of their left-wing affiliations and the case became notorious worldwide.
Dred Scott (1795?–1858)

Dred Scott was the black slave who sued for his freedom on the grounds that he had lived in a free terri-
tory. The Supreme Court in 1857 ruled that Scott, as a slave, had no right to bring a case to court in the
first place, and in any case was the property of his owner – in other words a slave could be taken anywhere
and would remain a slave. The implications of this were that no state had the right to ban slavery.
William Seward (1801–1872)

William Seward started his political career as a Whig but became one of the leading figures in the Republican
movement in the 1850s, and, having failed to gain his party’s nomination for the Presidency in 1860, he
became Lincoln’s Secretary of State, and went on to purchase Alaska from Russia in 1867.
Daniel Shays (1747–1825)

Daniel Shays a veteran of the War of Independence led a rebellion of debtors in Massachusetts in 1786–7
in an attempt to get debts cancelled. His actions and the level of support he achieved led to great alarm
BIOGRAPHIES • 317
1111 among men of property and created much greater support for the Philadelphia Convention which met in
2111 1787 to write a new constitution.
3
4111 William Sherman (1820–1891)
5 William Sherman made his reputation in the Civil War, and gained notoriety for his destructive march
6 from Atlanta to Savannah. He was made head of the army after the war.
7
8 George Shulz (1920– )
9 George Shulz was Secretary of State in the Nixon and Reagan administrations. He was dubious about SDI
10111 and developed a good working relationship with Gorbachev and his aides, facilitating the successful summit
1 meetings of the late 1980s and the end of the Cold War.
2
Sitting Bull (1834–1890)
3
Sitting Bull (or Tatanka Iyotake in Indian) was a Native American chief of the Dakota Sioux who led his
4
people in the Sioux War of 1876–7 that saw the defeat of Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. He
5
escaped to Canada but gave up in 1881 and went on to tour with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show. He was
6
killed by police during the ‘Ghost Dance’ uprising of 1890.
7
8 Alexander Stephens (1812–1883)
9 Alexander Stephens, having initially opposed secession, became Confederate Vice-President in 1861. He
20111 returned to the US Congress between 1874 and 1883, and in 1882 was elected governor of Georgia.
1
2 Thaddeus Stevens (1792–1868)
3 Thaddeus Stevens was a leading Radical Republican during Reconstruction and chaired the impeachment
4 trial of Andrew Johnson.
5
6 Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–1896)
7 Harriet Beecher Stowe gained fame through her novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin which apparently had a major
8 influence on Northern attitudes towards slavery.
9
30 William Taft (1857–1930)
1 William Taft became 27th President of the US in 1909 with the blessing of his predecessor Theodore
2 Roosevelt, who then ran against him in the election of 1912. During his term in office a number of trusts
3 were prosecuted.
4
Roger B. Taney (1777–1864)
5
Roger B. Taney was made Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in 1836. Taney’s most famous judgement
6
was in the case of Dred Scott where he ruled the Missouri Compromise of 1820 to be unconstitutional.
7
8 Frederick Jackson Turner (1861–1932)
9 Frederick Jackson Turner was a historian best known for his paper on ‘The Significance of the Frontier in
40 American History’ in 1893.
1
2 ‘Boss’ William Tweed (1823–1878)
3 William Tweed was the most notorious ‘boss’ of New York’s Democrat machine, Tammany Hall, who lined
4 his pockets at the expense of taxpayers. He was exposed by the New York Times in 1871 and sent to jail.
45
46 John Tyler (1790–1862)
47 John Tyler became the 10th President of the US following the death of William Harrison in 1841 only a
48 month after his inauguration. He presided over the annexation of Texas in 1845 and became a member of
49222 the Confederate Congress when Civil War broke out.
318 • BIOGRAPHIES
Cyrus Vance (1917– )

Cyrus Vance was Secretary of State under Jimmy Carter and his rivalry with hardline security adviser
Zbigniew Brzezinski led to contradictions in foreign policy. He resigned over the Iranian hostage affair in
1980.
William Vanderbilt (1821–1885)

William Vanderbilt was the eldest son of railroad financier Cornelius Vanderbilt, and extended his father’s
controlling interest in American railroads.
Bartolomeo Vanzetti (1888–1927)

Bartolomeo Vanzetti was accused with Nicola Sacco of a payroll robbery and murder in 1920, and was
executed seven years later, with very little evidence having been produced to suggest he was guilty. It is
generally felt that Sacco and Vanzetti were victims of the ‘anti-red hysteria’ of the time.
Benjamin Wade (1800–1878)

Benjamin Wade, having become a lawyer, joined the Whig Party and later the Republicans, and was elected
to the Senate in 1851. He went on to champion votes for women and trade union rights, and was fervently
anti-slavery. During the Civil War he became one of the Radical Republicans who criticised Lincoln. Wade
was the presiding officer of the 40th Congress which meant that he would have become President had
Johnson been successfully impeached. Some have suggested that this may have tipped the balance in
Johnson’s favour.
Booker T. Washington (1856–1915)

Booker T. Washington was a teacher and founder of the Tuskegee Negro National Institute. He wanted to
provide essentially vocational education for African Americans and became a Presidential adviser on African
American affairs.
George Washington (1732–1799)

George Washington was commander of American forces against the British during the War of
Independence, President of the Philadelphia Convention in 1787, which wrote the Constitution, and subse-
quently became the first President of the United States in 1789.
Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)

Thomas Woodrow Wilson became the 28th President of the US in the election of 1912. He served two
terms in office and presided over a number of progressive reforms including women being granted the
vote, and the amendment to the Constitution which introduced Prohibition, but tends to be remembered
more for his role in the negotiations following the First World War and his part in creating the League of
Nations.
Malcolm X (1925–1965)
Malcom X was an African American leader who initially rejected cooperation with white liberals. He became
a leading spokesman for the Nation of Islam but was suspended from the movement after his conversion
to orthodox Islam. Before his assassination he preached brotherhood between black and white people.
1111
2111
3
4111 Glossary of Key Terms
5
6
7
8
9
10111 African Americans Americans of African origin.
1
Anti-Federalist Term broadly used to define anyone who opposed the adoption of the Constitution in the
2
late 1780s.
3
4 Appeasement The attempt by Britain and France in the 1930s to compromise with or meet the demands
5 of the dictators of Germany and Italy.
6
7 Bicameral Literally means ‘two chambers’ – in the case of the US used to refer to the legislative two-house
8 Congress established by the Constitution.
9 ‘Big stick’ The nickname for Theodore Roosevelt’s foreign policy, as in ‘speak softly and carry a big stick’.
20111 It represented a build-up of military strength and a more assertive foreign policy in the early 1900s.
1
2 Black cabinet A group of highly educated and highly trained African Americans who advised Franklin
3 Delano Roosevelt in the 1930s.
4
Black Codes Attempts made by Southern state legislatures to limit or avoid the extension of voting rights
5
to freed slaves immediately after the Civil War.
6
7 Brinkmanship A term sometimes used to describe US foreign policy in the Eisenhower and Kennedy era.
8 The US would take a tough approach towards the USSR and China, to the extent that it took relations to
9 the ‘brink’ of open war. This proved successful in facing down the US’s enemies but was a dangerous
30 approach to Cold War diplomacy, e.g. the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.
1
2 Carpet-baggers A term of abuse adopted by Southerners for Northerners who moved into the South in the
3 years following the Civil War, who in their eyes had come to exploit the South’s position for personal gain.
4 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Created in 1947 as one of several US intelligence agencies, the CIA took
5 responsibility for overseas espionage (spying) and was also used by the government to coordinate military
6 intervention in Third World countries, thus allowing the President to conduct foreign intervention without
7 involving Congress.
8
9 Civil rights The right of citizens to social and political equality.
40
Cold War The popular term to describe the state of mutual hostility and suspicion between the US and
1
USSR (also China after 1949) during the 1940s and 1950s. While both sides fought wars during this period,
2
outright superpower conflict never took place, hence a ‘cold’ rather than ‘hot war’. ‘Cold’ also describes
3
the chilly relations between the superpowers.
4
45 Communism The ideological belief in sharing all wealth, ownership and management of a state’s resources
46 among the working classes. Where practised (most notably in the USSR and China) it tended to lead to
47 repressive, authoritarian governments acting ‘on behalf’ of the workers. Communist states regarded the
48 West as corrupt, expansionist capitalists, whereas the West saw itself as the defender of human freedom
49222 against a dangerous, expansionist and repressive ideology.
320 • GLOSSARY OF KEY TERMS
Confederacy The name adopted by the Southern states which seceded from the Union in 1860 and 1861.
Confederation A union of states which created a loose system of alliance between them and did not involve
the states giving up as much power to a central authority as the Constitution adopted in 1789 required.
Congress The bicameral legislature created by the Constitution in 1787, and consisting of the House of
Representatives and the Senate. Prior to 1787 Congress was a unicameral body which had both legislative
and executive functions.
Congressional Reconstruction The period roughly between 1867 and 1877 when Congress took the initia-
tive in restoring the Union.
Constitution A set of rules to establish a framework for how a country or organisation might be run, which
may prescribe the powers of government and freedoms for the individual.
Containment An approach to US foreign policy developed under Truman in the late 1940s. The US was
not strong enough to risk attacking the USSR head-on but believed it should prevent the USSR from
spreading communism to states which were not communist. This approach set the tone of US foreign policy
through the 1950s and 1960s leading to costly interventions in Korea and Vietnam.
Dawes Plan Named after the US financier Charles G. Dawes, one of a team sent to Germany in 1924 to
investigate German problems with repaying the cost of the First World War. The result was a plan to
reschedule repayments over a longer period and grant Germany a large loan to aid economic recovery.
Détente A more conciliatory approach to US/USSR relations adopted for much of the 1960s and 1970s.
The US sought summit meetings, arms limitations agreements and diplomatic solutions in an attempt to
‘thaw’ the Cold War. This policy was criticised as a failure by Reagan in the early 1980s, who argued it had
left the US dangerously weak. He continued negotiations, but from a position of greater strength.
‘Domino theory’ The belief that if one Third World country were to turn communist, other neighbouring
countries would be more likely to turn communist as a result. If you make an upright line of dominoes
and push one over, the rest will be knocked over in turn. This belief supported the view that a policy of
containment was necessary.
‘Doves’ US political jargon referring to politicians who seek peaceful solutions to foreign conflict, as
opposed to ‘hawks’.
Economic colonialism US policy in the late nineteenth century was to avoid the acquisition of colonial
possessions, and instead to seek economic influence in independent states such as Hawaii (until 1898). A
state would, in theory, govern its own affairs but much of its economic production would fall under the
control of US business interests.
Enlightenment The movement beginning in seventeenth-century England inspired by such people as Isaac
Newton and John Locke, and spreading to France in the eighteenth century, which stressed the import-
ance of science and reason and argued that individuals could improve their lot rather than simply accepting
it. The movement undermined much traditional authority and religious practice.
EXCOM Special committee set up by Kennedy in 1962 to provide advice during the Cuban missile crisis.
Federalists Initially used as a term for those who supported the adoption of the Constitution, and later
used as a term for the political party which championed strong central government.
Fourteen Points President Woodrow Wilson announced a peace plan in January 1918 on which to base
negotiations for an end to the First World War. The plan consisted of 14 separate points, including national
self-determination and a League of Nations. Most of the plan did not survive the Paris Peace Conference
in 1919, where a more vindictive mood predominated.
GLOSSARY OF KEY TERMS • 321
1111 Free territories Land owned by the US which had not become organised into states, and in which slavery
2111 was barred.
3
4111 ‘Great silent majority’ A phrase used by Nixon in 1969 to undermine the credibility of anti-Vietnam War
5 protesters. He claimed that most Americans supported his policy towards Vietnam and it was only a
6 minority that was vocally protesting. The phrase has become a cliché in US politics and was even used
7 more recently in response to protests against the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
8 ‘Green Berets’ The nickname given to special US troops sent to South Vietnam by Kennedy to coordinate
9
resistance against communist insurgency, prior to the start of the Vietnam War proper.
10111
1 Harlem Renaissance The term given to the emergence of African American writers and musicians in
2 Harlem during the 1920s.
3
4 ‘Hawks’ US political jargon referring to politicians who readily seek military solutions to foreign conflict,
5 as opposed to the ‘doves’.
6 Hispanic Americans Americans of Spanish origin, including people from Mexico, Puerto Rico and Cuba.
7
8 Imperial Presidency Derogatory term used to describe the ability of Presidents to conduct foreign policy
9 without proper restraint from Congress for much of the Cold War period. One of the key aims of the US
20111 Constitution is to impose checks upon Presidential power, so US Presidents should not be able to act like
1 old-style emperors.
2
3 Inaugural speech The first speech given by a new President at his inauguration ceremony.
4 ‘Iron Curtain’ Phrase first used by Winston Churchill in 1946. The USSR, having secured control of many
5
central and eastern European states, had begun to deprive the people living in those states of the freedom
6
to travel and communicate with the West, hence ‘an iron curtain has descended across Europe’. Churchill’s
7
speech, delivered to a US audience, was controversial at the time but achieved its aim of warning the US
8
not to withdraw its presence from Western Europe. Throughout the Cold War the West referred to coun-
9
tries such as East Germany, Poland, Hungary, etc. as being ‘behind the Iron Curtain’.
30
1 Irreconcilables The name given to senators who absolutely rejected any involvement in a League of Nations
2 after the First World War. They only numbered a minority in the Senate but when their votes were combined
3 with those of more moderate ‘Reservationists’, this was enough to block the US from joining the League.
4 This was an early sign of the US moving towards isolationism after the war.
5
6 Isolationism An approach to foreign policy that would reject binding commitments towards other states
7 and international institutions, in effect ‘isolating’ the US from world affairs and thus avoiding costly foreign
8 interventions such as the First World War. In practice, the US was never truly isolationist although there
9 was public pressure to increase isolationism, especially in the early 1930s.
40
‘Jim Crow’ laws Laws passed in the Southern states in the 1870s and 1880s to limit the rights of African
1
2 Americans and to segregate them from white Americans.
3 Ku Klux Klan Terrorist society that was formed in 1866 by a group of former Confederate soldiers. It was
4 outlawed in 1871 but had re-emerged by the 1920s.
45
46 Lame duck The name given to the remaining time in office for an outgoing President or House of
47 Representatives following a national election, before the incoming President or House actually take their
48 seats. It implies that the remaining time in office is a period of weakness in which not much can be
49222 achieved.
Lend-lease In 1941 the US began to offer Britain a supply of arms on credit. This became known as ‘lend-
lease’ and is an example of the US stepping away from isolation and towards involvement in the Second
World War, some months before Pearl Harbor.
Linkage A term used by Kissinger to describe diplomatic initiatives that might solve more than one
problem, e.g. a beneficial economic deal with the USSR might also encourage the USSR to reduce inter-
vention in Third World countries and thus reduce the need for US ‘containment’. Linkage took place in
the context of ‘détente’ between the superpowers.
‘Long telegram’ An 8,000 word telegram sent to Truman’s government in 1946 by Kennan, a US govern-
ment agent based in the USSR. It warned of innate Soviet hostility towards the US and encouraged Truman
to introduce his policy of ‘containment’ the following year.
Marshall Plan A plan to provide US economic aid to war-damaged European countries, put forward by
Secretary of State George Marshall in 1947. The plan was rejected by the USSR but was applied with some
success in Western Europe and helped to pave the way for the formation of NATO in 1949.
McCarthyism Named after senator Joseph McCarthy, this term describes the wave of anti-communist
hysteria that led to reckless and often unsubstantiated accusations across US politics and society, an in-
famous example being the ‘blacklists’ circulating in the Hollywood film industry, between 1950 and 1954.
McCarthy was by no means the sole cause of this persecution but he was the most prominent figure involved
in making accusations.
‘Merchants of death’ One theory regarding the reasons the US went to war in 1917 was that arms manu-
facturers had stood to make a great profit. Such manufacturers were nicknamed ‘merchants of death’.
Monroe Doctrine Formulated by President Monroe in 1823, a claim that all of the Americas lay within
the US’s sphere of interest. This attitude was evident in the US’s intervention in several Caribbean, Pacific
and Central and South American states during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including the
Spanish-American War of 1898.
Muckraking Term given to a style of journalism which sought to expose a range of social problems and
various other scandals and corruption, often in a sensationalist way, towards the end of the nineteenth
century and early twentieth century.
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) The rationale that if both the US and USSR had sufficient nuclear
weaponry to destroy each other, then this would act as a deterrent to both sides. If the USSR launched a
nuclear attack on the US, or vice versa, then both sides would be utterly destroyed.
National Security Council (NSC) The NSC was a government department set up in 1947 in response to
the onset of the Cold War. It studied national security issues closely and advised the President on foreign
policy. In 1950 it advised huge increases in defence spending on conventional weapons in order to match
and contain the USSR.
Native Americans A more politically correct term used in recent times to denote the inhabitants of America
who were once referred to as Indians or Red Indians, descendants of the peoples who inhabited the Americas
before white Europeans settled the continent.
New Look A proposal to shift the emphasis on US defence spending away from conventional weapons to
nuclear weapons. The phrase was used by Eisenhower in the run-up to his election as President in 1952
and was promised to provide effective defence at less cost, ‘more bang for the buck’. This escalated the
superpowers’ nuclear arms race.
North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) A military alliance, based on mutual assistance in case of
attack, established in 1949 and comprising the US, Canada and most Western European states. The US
GLOSSARY OF KEY TERMS • 323
1111 responded with its own military alliance network of ‘Iron Curtain’ states (‘The Warsaw Pact’), and the
2111 result was a divided, but also stabilised, Europe until the 1990s.
3
‘Open Door’ Proposal made in the 1890s that there should be no international restrictions of trade with
4111
China. China was a huge potential source of raw materials and market for US goods, but was too politi-
5
cally weak to prevent foreign powers from grabbing control over its foreign trade. Unrestricted trade was
6
in the interests of the US but was increasingly threatened by Japanese expansion in the 1930s.
7
8 President The holder of this office created by the Constitution would be both the head of state and the
9 head of the executive branch of government.
10111
Presidential Reconstruction The period between 1863 and 1867 when Presidents Lincoln and then Johnson
1
took the initiative in trying to restore the unity of the US.
2
3 Rebel states Term used to denote the Southern states that seceded from the Union prior to the Civil War.
4
Reparations Literally payment of damages. After the First World War, the Paris Peace Conference resolved
5
that Germany would pay reparations but the figure was set very high and was hard to extract from a resentful
6
and economically weak Germany. The US came up with financial plans to help German recovery in the
7
1920s but these were wrecked by the Great Depression of the early 1930s.
8
9 Reservationists The name given to senators who did not absolutely reject any involvement in a League of
20111 Nations after the First World War, but did wish to see amendments to the League so that the US’s member-
1 ship would not be too binding. This made agreement in the Senate difficult and when their votes were
2 combined with those of the more hardline ‘Irreconcilables’ this was enough to block the US from joining
3 the League.
4
Reservations Land allocated to Native Americans by the federal government in order to remove them from
5
lands that white settlers wished to occupy.
6
7 Roll-back A more ambitious version of ‘containment’ whereby the US would work to remove communist
8 or pro-communist governments in the Third World. Apart from an initial success in the Korean War in
9 1950, roll-back was not successful until the 1990s, and then generated by the internal collapse of the USSR
30 rather than US foreign intervention.
1
‘Roosevelt Corollary’ A more assertive version of the Monroe Doctrine, introduced by President Theodore
2
Roosevelt. The US would oppose any European imperialism in the Americas and would take pre-emptive
3
action if necessary. This reflected US concern at the rapid expansion of European empires in the late nine-
4
teenth and early twentieth centuries, and was supported by continued development of the US navy.
5
6 ‘Rough Riders’ The nickname for a volunteer cavalry unit that fought in the 1898 Spanish-American War.
7 The unit was led by Theodore Roosevelt and made him a popular hero, helping him to rise rapidly to the
8 US Presidency. The Rough Riders seem closer to the nineteenth-century ‘Wild West’ than to modern US
9 warfare. Roosevelt was one of a number of US Presidents who have been elected following a successful
40 military career.
1
Scalawags Term of abuse for Southern whites who collaborated with Northerners in the South during
2
Reconstruction.
3
4 Secession The breaking away of Southern states from the Union to form the Confederacy.
45
Senate The ‘upper house’ of the US Congress in which every state is represented equally, by two senators.
46
47 ‘Separate but equal’ The principle that established separate services and facilities, such as schools, seats on
48 buses and park benches for African Americans. These segregated services and facilities were meant to be
49222 of an equal quality and standard to those enjoyed by white people but they rarely were.
South East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) A military alliance between the US, Australia, New Zealand
and several Asian states (e.g. Thailand and Pakistan), established in 1954 and designed to contain the spread
of communism.
Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) A series of summit meetings between the US and USSR between
1967 and 1979, which led to a major treaty known as SALT I in 1972. This treaty set a precedent for arms
limitation. A further treaty, SALT II, was signed in 1979 but never ratified. SALT was the centrepiece of
the ‘détente’ period of superpower relations.
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) A 1980s plan for a new defence system, to be based in space, that would
in theory destroy enemy nuclear missiles before they could reach the US. It was championed by Reagan
and often nicknamed ‘Star Wars’ after the film.
Supreme Court The highest court of the US judicial system, which, through the establishment of precedent,
came to have the power to interpret the Constitution and on occasion to declare laws passed by Congress
illegal.
Totalitarianism A system of government where the state has ‘total’ control over its people through a combin-
ation of indoctrination and repression. The term was used by the West to criticise communist government.
Truman Doctrine Another name for the policy of ‘containment’ introduced by Truman in 1947. It pledged
the US to ‘support free peoples who are resisting attempted aggression by armed minorities or outside
pressure’. The doctrine was initially applied to US aid to the governments of Greece and Turkey.
‘Uncle Tom’ A term taken from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ to describe an African
American who is considered to be excessively obedient or servile.
Unicameral Literally means ‘one chamber’ and in the case of the US it usually is used to refer to the idea
of a legislative body with only one house, such as Congress prior to 1789.
Viet Cong A communist guerrilla force supported by North Vietnam, operating in South Vietnam. The
central aim of the US’s military intervention in South Vietnam in the 1960s was to drive out the Viet Cong.
It failed.
‘Vietnamization’ The policy towards Vietnam introduced by Nixon. The US would reduce its forces in
South Vietnam and instead train and encourage South Vietnamese troops to fight the Viet Cong.
Warsaw Pact More correctly named the Warsaw Treaty Organisation, this was a military alliance of the
USSR and the communist ‘satellite’ states of central and eastern Europe, established in 1955. It was designed
to counter the threat of NATO in Europe.
1111
2111
3
4111 Select Bibliography
5
6
7
8
9
10111 Stephen E. Ambrose and Douglas G. Brinkley, Rise to Martin McCauley, Russia, America and the Cold War
1 Globalism, 8th edition, Penguin (1997). 1949–1991, Pearson (1998).
2 Colin Bonwick, The American Revolution, Palgrave (1991). James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, Penguin (1990).
3 Peter Brett, The USA and the World, 1917–45, Hodder & John W. Mason, The Cold War 1945–1991, Routledge
4 Stoughton (1997). (1996).
Alan Brinkley, The Unfinished Nation, McGraw-Hill John M. Murrin, Paul E. Johnson, James M. McPherson
5
(2000). et al., Liberty Equality Power, Harcourt (2001).
6
Hugh Brogan, The Penguin History of the USA, Penguin David Paterson, Doug Willoughby and Susan Willoughby,
7 (1985/1999). Civil Rights in the USA 1863–1980, Heinemann
8 Mark S. Byrnes, The Truman Years 1945–1953, Pearson (2001).
9 (2000). Brian Holden Reid, The Origins of the American Civil War,
20111 Henry Steele Commager, The Blue and the Gray, The Longman (1996).
1 Fairfax Press (1982). Patrick Renshaw, America in the Era of the Two World
2 Alan Farmer, The American Civil War 1861–1865, Hodder Wars 1910–1945, Longman (1996).
3 & Stoughton (1996). Clinton Rossiter, 1787: The Grand Convention, Norton
4 Alan Farmer, The Origins of the American Civil War (1987).
5 1846–1861, Hodder & Stoughton (1996). Robert D. Schulzinger, US Diplomacy since 1900, 5th
Eric Foner, Reconstruction, America’s Unfinished Revolu- edition, Oxford University Press (2002).
6
tion 1863–1877, Harper & Row (1984). Richard Sobel, The Impact of Public Opinion on US
7
J.K. Galbraith, The Great Crash 1929, Penguin (1975). Foreign Policy Since Vietnam, Oxford University Press
8 M.J. Heale, The American Revolution, Methuen (1986). (2001).
9 Michael Holt, The Political Crisis of the 1850s, Norton Kenneth Stampp, The Causes of the Civil War, Touchstone,
30 (1978). Simon & Schuster (1991).
1 Akira Iriye, The Globalising of America 1913–1945, John Traynor, Mastering Modern United States History,
2 Cambridge University Press (1993). Palgrave (2001).
3 Maldwyn Jones, The Limits of Liberty, Oxford University Hugh Tulloch, The Debate on the American Civil War Era,
4 Press (1994). Manchester University Press (1999).
5 Walter LaFeber, The American Search for Opportunity, Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States,
6 Cambridge University Press (1993). Longman (1996).
7
8
9
40
1
2
3
4
45
46
47
48
49222
Index
Accommodationism 262, 263 Burnside, Ambrose 68, 77

Afghanistan, invasion of 218, 224, 238, 239, 240, 248 Burr, Aaron 12
African Americans 2, 19, 93, chapter 10 Bush, George 224, 235, 240, 266, 275, 276, 281, 282,
Agnew, Spiro 276 295–8, 300, 309
Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) 158, 162–4, 180, Bush, George W. 225, 282, 283
183–5, 187, 188
Annapolis Convention 22 Calhoun Doctrine 36
Antietam, battle of (see also Sharpsburg) 65, 68, 73, 74, Calhoun, John C 43, 45, 47, 48, 54, 60–2, 309
77, 84, 87, 88 Capone, Al 134, 146, 149–51, 309
Anti-federalists 11, 27, 32, 33 Carnegie, Andrew 94, 102, 108, 112, 128, 309
Alien Act 12, 32 Carter, Jimmy 224, 238, 240, 275, 276, 279, 280–2,
Al Qaeda 219 291–5, 299, 300, 302, 309
Amendments, first ten (see also Bill of Rights) 11, 15, 18, Chancellorsville, battle of 65, 68, 75, 77
30–2 Chattanooga, battle of 65, 69, 74
American Federation of Labor 94, 108, 120 Chickamauga, battle of 65, 69, 76, 79
Anaconda Plan 67, 70 Chinese Americans chapter 10
Appomattox 65, 69 Chinese Exclusion Act 116, 127, 250, 254
Articles of Confederation 4, 5, 8, 9, 20, 22, 29–31 Christiana, battle of 46, 59
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) 158, 161, 163, 169,
Bay of Pigs 218, 231, 233 170, 188
Bill of Rights (see also Amendments, first ten) 1, 11, 20, Civil Rights Acts: (1866) 250, 252, 253, 259, 260
21, 23, 30, 33 (1875) 111, 250, 252, 268
Berlin blockade 218, 228, 242, 247 (1957) 250
Berlin Wall 218, 219, 222, 231, 233, 247 (1964) 250, 257
Black Codes 110, 112, 252, 260, 263 (1967) 251
Black Power 250, 258, 262–5, 270 Civil Works Administration (CWA) 158, 161, 170
‘Bleeding Kansas’ 36,48, 55, 57 Clay, Henry 13, 36, 38, 43, 45, 47, 62, 309
‘border states’ 17, 56, 59, 70, 79, 82, 87, 89 Clayton Anti-Trust Act 95, 105, 117, 121
Boston massacre 5, 7 Clinton, Bill 225, 258, 266, 276, 281, 282, 289, 297, 298,
Boston Tea Party 5, 7 300, 302
‘bourbons’ 99, 112 Cold Harbor, battle of 69, 72, 74, 76
Boxer Rebellion 190, 192, 201, 202 ‘Common Sense’ 8
Brains Trust 159, 166 Compromise of 1850 36, 45
‘brinkmanship’ 217, 221, 232 Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) 250, 255, 257, 262,
Brown, John 36, 42, 43, 49, 50, 52, 53, 55, 57, 60, 62, 97, 283
308 Contras, Nicaraguan 224, 296
Brown v. Board of Education 249, 250, 256–8, 266, 268, Coolidge, Calvin 130, 134–6, 138, 141, 143, 194, 206, 310
269–71, 274 Crittenden Plan 44, 57
Bryan, William Jennings 101, 104, 133, 308 Cuban Missile Crisis 217, 218, 222, 231–3, 238, 247
Buchanan, James 17, 36, 51–3, 62, 63, 65, 309 Custer, General George Armstrong 76, 100, 115, 310
Bull Run, first battle of (see also Manassas) 65, 67, 71,
75, 80, 84 Davis, Jefferson 36, 37, 40, 43, 48, 57, 60–2, 65, 69, 70,
Burns, Anthony 47, 49 74, 76, 78–85, 90, 96, 310
INDEX • 327
1111 Dawes Act 100, 115, 254, 261 Grant, Ulysses S 5, 18, 26, 27, 64, 65, 67, 69, 72–4, 76,
2111 Dawes Plan 190, 194, 250 79, 80, 81, 83–6, 88, 89, 94, 97, 98, 110–12, 311
3 D-Day 218, 219 Great Compromise 24, 34
4111 Debs, Eugene 105, 109, 123, 131, 134, 144, 172 Great Society 245, 275, 276, 278, 284–7, 299, 300
5 Declaration of Independence 5, 8, 34 Greeley, Horace 18
Desert Storm, Operation 219 Guadalupe Hidalgo, treaty of 36, 45
6
Domino Theory 221 Gulf War 240, 293
7
Douglas, Stephen 16, 36–9, 43, 45, 51, 52, 56–9, 62, 310
8 Douglass, Frederick 40, 58, 59, 310 Hamilton, Alexander 9,11, 12, 23, 32–4, 311
9 Du Bois, W.E.B. 249, 253, 262–4, 274, 310 Harding, Warren 130, 134–6, 143, 146, 194, 205, 312
10111 Dulles, John Foster 221, 311 Harper’s Ferry 36, 49, 77
1 Hayes, Rutherford 5, 94, 98, 108, 312
2 Economic Recovery Tax Act 276, 295 Haymarket Bombing 94
3 Eisenhower, Dwight 215, 221, 229, 230, 232, 234, 238, Hiroshima 218
4 256, 257, 270, 276, 278, 280, 283 Hispanic Americans chapter 10
5 Emancipation Proclamation 81, 86–9, 250, 252 Homestead Act 5, 17, 48, 50, 61, 99, 114
6 Emergency Banking Relief Act 158, 165 Homestead Steel Strike 109
7 Emergency Quota Act 133 Hooker, Joseph 68, 69, 77, 312
Energy Security Act 276 Hoover, Herbert 130, 134–6, 139, 140, 141, 143, 147,
8
Espionage Act 130, 194 148, 152, 154, 206, 312
9
‘Hundred Days’ 160–2, 164, 166, 176, 177, 184
20111 Fair Labor Standards Act 158
1 Farrakhan, Louis 251 Immigration Restriction League 94, 106, 127
2 Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) 158, Independence, War of 4, 5, 8
3 161, 169, 188 Declaration of (see Declaration of Independence)
4 Federal Housing Act (FHA) 158 Indians (see also Native Americans) 8, 15, 16, 23, 24, 99,
5 Federalists 11, 12, 13, 15, 27, 30, 32, 33, 47 100, 114, 115, 142, and Chapter 10
6 First World War 105, 110, 117, 122, 130, 133, 138, Indian Reorganisation Act 250, 261
7 140–3, 148, 151, 189, 190, 193, 196, 200, 202, 203, Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) (Wobblies) 95,
8 205–7, 209, 212–15 105, 110, 117
9 Force Acts 98, 111, 112 Interstate Commerce Act 94
Ford, Gerald 224, 237, 239, 240, 275, 276, 279, 281, 282, Intolerable Acts 7
30
289, 290–2, 294, 298, 299, 311 Iran-Contra affair 276, 289, 295, 296, 300, 302
1
Ford, Henry 128, 136, 139, 142, 152, 167, 311
2 Forrest, Nathan Bedford 75, 76, 83, 84 Jackson, Andrew 5, 13, 14, 16, 26, 47, 312
3 Fort Sumter 36, 57, 65–7 Jackson, Jesse 251, 258, 312
4 Fort Wagner 65, 72 Jackson, Thomas ‘Stonewall’ 65, 68, 84–6, 312
5 Founding Fathers 1, 9–11, 16, 19, 20–3, 29, 30, 47 Japanese Americans chapter 10
6 Fredericksburg, battle of 65, 68 Jefferson, Thomas 5, 8, 11, 12, 14, 16, 24, 26, 32–4, 36,
7 Freedmen’s Bureau 94, 97, 98, 250, 252, 259, 260 37, 40, 43, 47, 48, 313
8 Free Soil Party 44, 49 Jim Crow 112, 250, 253, 258, 263, 266–8
9 French and Indian War 1, 5, 6 Johnson, Andrew 2, 3, 5, 17, 18, 26, 27, 34, 94, 96, 97,
40 Fugitive Slave Act 46, 57–9 100, 110, 111, 313
1 Johnson, Lyndon B. 218, 222–4, 233–8, 245, 246, 275–9,
Gadsden Purchase 7, 36, 38, 50 285, 286, 287, 290, 291, 299, 302, 313
2
Gag Rule 42, 53 Johnston, Joseph E 67–9, 75, 80, 81, 83, 84, 86, 313
3
Garrison, William Lloyd 40, 42, 49, 53, 62, 69, 311
4 Geneva Accords 218, 221 Kansas-Nebraska Act 24, 36, 39, 51
45 Gettysburg, battle of 64, 65, 68–70, 73–5, 77, 81, 84, Kellogg-Briand Pact 190, 206
46 85 Kennedy John F. 215, 218, 221, 222, 231–4, 238, 257,
47 Glass-Steagal Act 141, 148, 158, 165 262, 276–8, 283–7, 290, 292, 295, 299, 302, 313
48 Gompers, Samuel 94, 108, 109, 120, 311 Kennedy, Robert 257, 276, 278, 284, 302
49222 Gould, Jay 102, 103 Kent State University 223, 231
328 • INDEX
Kentucky Resolution 24, 31, 32 Missouri Compromise 13, 14, 16, 24, 36, 38,39, 57, 61
Khrushchev 222, 231–3, 277 Mitchell, John 109, 125–7, 131, 143, 315
King Jr, Martin Luther, 249–51, 256–8, 264–5, 271, 276, Molly Maguires 108, 120
313 Monkey Trial (see also Scopes Trial) 129, 132, 144, 149,
King, Rodney 251, 258, 298 151
Knights of Labor 94, 108, 119–20 Monroe Doctrine 190–2, 197, 200, 201, 204, 205,
‘Know-Nothing’s 14, 43, 56, 105 211–13, 215, 315
Korean War 218, 221, 229, 230 Montesquieu, Baron de 9, 19, 22, 30
Ku Klux Klan 98, 112, 129, 131, 132, 144, 145, 150, 152, Montgomery bus boycott 250, 256, 264–5
156 Morgan, J.P. 102, 104, 109, 116, 121, 124, 128, 131, 315
Ku Klux Klan Act 94
Kuwait, invasion of 225, 240, 281, 297 Nashville, battle of 65, 69
National Association for the Advancement of Colored
La Follette, Robert M 94, 103, 122, 135, 152, 154, 178, People (NAACP) 122, 250, 253, 255, 256, 258, 262–5,
313 268, 271
LA riots 250, 251 National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) 158, 161, 162,
League of Nations 134, 190, 194, 196, 203–5, 207 164, 166–8, 171, 174, 178–81
Lecompton Constitution 36, 42, 51 National Labor Relations Act (see also Wagner Act) 158,
Lee, Richard Henry 8, 20, 21 162, 168, 174, 176, 179
Lee, Robert E. 41, 65, 66, 68, 69, 72, 74, 75, 77, 79–86, National Labor Union 94, 107, 119
313 National Recovery Administration (NRA) 158, 166–9,
‘lend-lease’ 191, 197, 208 174, 178, 181, 187, 188
‘Liberator’, the 36, 42, 49, 53 Native Americans 8, 9, 14, 21, 99, 100, 249, 250 and
Liberty Party 44, 53 chapter 10
Little Rock 250, 256, 257, 270 New Deal chapter 7
Lincoln, Abraham 2, 5, 15, 17, 24, 26–8, 36–8, 40, 41, 43, New Frontier 275–7, 283, 285, 286
44, 49, 50, 94–6, 110, 111, 251, 252, 299, 313; and New Right 280
chapter 4 Nixon, Richard M 215, 218, 221, 223, 224, 234–7, 239,
Lincoln–Douglas debates 36, 37, 56, 58 244–7, 276–82, 285, 288–92, 295, 297–9, 302, 315
Little Big Horn, battle of 100, 115 North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) 218, 220,
Locke, John 8, 9, 12, 21, 22, 29, 30, 33, 314 221, 223, 225, 229, 232, 240, 243
Long, Huey 158, 163, 173, 177, 178 Nullification Crisis 14, 36, 49, 53
Louisiana Purchase 1, 5, 7, 14, 16, 33, 38
‘Loving v. Virginia’ 250 Omnibus Budget and Reconstruction Act 276, 295
Ludlow Massacre 109, 110 ‘open door’ policy 190, 194, 196, 201, 202
Ostend Manifesto 36
McCarthy/McCarthyism 229, 230, 314
McClellan, General George 65, 67, 68, 74, 75, 77, 78, 82, Paine, Thomas 8, 21, 22, 30, 34, 315
84, 86, 88–90, 314 Palmer Raids 130, 131, 143, 151, 315
‘McCulloch v. Maryland’ 15, 27, 33 Panama Canal Treaty 190
McKinley, William 101, 104, 113, 121, 124, 210–2, 314 Parks, Rosa 256, 315
Madison, James 9, 11–13, 15, 21, 24, 29, 30, 32–4, 314 Peace of Paris 5, 6, 8, 9, 22, 23, 30
Manassas, first battle of (see also Bull Run) 65, 67 Pearl Harbor 189, 191, 195, 197, 202, 207, 209, 218,
Manhattan Project 219, 228 219
‘Marbury v. Madison’ 15, 33 Philadelphia Convention 5, 9, 11, 30, 31
Marshall, John 15, 16, 27, 33, 314 Pierce, Franklin 36, 47, 50
Marshall Plan 218, 220, 242, 243, 247 Platt Amendment 190
‘massive retaliation’ 222, 236 Plessy v. Ferguson 249, 250, 253, 256, 266–70, 274
Meade, General George 69, 74, 77, 86, 314 Polk, James 17, 36, 42, 45
Mellon, Andrew 134–6, 315 Pontiac’s Rising 6
Mexican War 14, 36, 42, 43, 75, 81 Populism, Populists 93, 100, 101, 118, 119, 120
Midway, battle of 219 Pottawatomie Massacre 36
Mississippi Plan 98, 112 Powderly, Terence 108, 119, 315
INDEX • 329
1111 Progressives, Progressivism 93, 103, 105, 117, 120, 121, Slaughterhouse Case 16
2111 122, 128, 134 Social Security Act 158, 161, 163, 168, 170, 173, 174,
3 Prohibition 102, 103, 120, 151, 152, 156, 158, and 176–9, 187, 188
4111 Chapter 6 South East Asia Treaty Organisation (SEATO) 218, 221,
5 Public Utility Holding Company Act 158, 162, 179 233
Pullman Strike 94, 116, 120, 123, 124 Spanish-American War 109, 189, 190, 197–8, 200,
6
210
7
Quebec Act 7 spoils system 14, 16
8 Spotsylvania Court House, battle of 69, 74
9 Randolph, A. Philip 255, 315 Sputnik 218, 221
10111 Regan, Ronald 215, 224, 234, 237, 238, 240, 246, 275, Star Wars (see also Strategic Defence Initiative) 218, 225,
1 276, 280–2, 284, 291–8, 300, 301, 315 294
2 Reconstruction 1, 2, 17, 18, 25, 26, 89, 249, 252, 259, Stephens, Alexander 37, 48, 81, 82, 96, 317
3 260, 299 and Chapter 5 Stephens, Uriah 94
4 Reconstruction Acts 18, 97, 99, 111, 250, 252 Stevens, Thaddeus 96, 111, 317
5 Redeemers 99, 112 Stowe, Harriet Beecher 40, 49, 62, 317
6 Red Scare 110, 129–31, 133, 143, 151 Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) (see also Star Wars)
7 Revenue Act 130, 135 218, 224, 294
Revenue Tax Act 163, 178 Stuart, J.E.B. 76, 77, 84, 86
8
Riis, Jacob 94, 103, 113, 117, 118, 121, 316 Sumner, Charles 36, 42, 96
9
Rockefeller, John D 94, 102, 109, 112, 128, 131, 146, Sylvis, William 94, 107, 119
20111 316
1 Roosevelt Corollary 190, 200, 201 Taft, William 93, 95, 104–6, 116, 117, 120–2, 127, 201,
2 Roosevelt, Franklin (FDR) 130, 134, 141, 143, 148, 317
3 207–9, 215, 218, 219, 227, 228, 241, 244, 316 Taney, Roger B 16, 17, 27, 51–3, 81, 317
4 Roosevelt, Theodore 93, 95, 103–5, 109, 116, 117, Taylor, Zachary 36, 43, 45, 46
5 120–4, 159, 189, 190, 192, 193, 196, 198–202, 2–6, Tehran Conference 218, 219, 227
6 213, 214, 316 Tennessee Valley Administration (TVA) 158, 162, 179,
7 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 21, 22, 30 188
8 Tet Offensive 218, 222, 234, 235–7, 245–7
9 Sacco and Vanzetti 129–31, 144, 151, 155, 316, 318 Triangle Shirtwaist Fire 109
SALT I 218, 239, 224 Truman Doctrine 218, 220, 221, 225, 229, 242, 243
30
SALT II 239, 240, 293 Truman, Harry 225, 227–30, 241–4, 248
1
Scopes Trial (see also Monkey Trial) 130 Truth-in-Securities Act 158
2 Scott, Dred 14, 16, 26, 27, 36, 37, 40, 42, 45, 48, 50, 51, Turner, Frederick Jackson 99, 317
3 53, 55, 316 Turner, Nat 36, 42, 47, 49, 53
4 Scott, Winfield 57 Tuskegee Institute 262
5 Second World War 158, 159, 191, 196, 197, 202, 205–9, Tweed, ‘Boss’ William 94, 97, 100, 113, 114, 128, 317
6 217, 219–21, 226–8, 233, 236, 242–4, 249, 251, 255, Tyler, John 14, 17, 36, 42, 43, 54, 62, 317
7 256, 261, 276, 297
8 Securities Exchange Act 158 Uncle Tom’s Cabin 36, 40, 49, 54
9 Sedition Act (1798) 5, 12, 25, 31, 32–3, 40, 47
40 (1917/18) 105, 117, 130 Van Buren, Martin 14, 17
1 Seven Days Battle 68, 76 Vanderbilt, William 102, 318
Seven Years War 1, 5, 6, 30 Versailles Treaty 189. 190, 194, 203–5
2
Seward, William 24, 37, 39, 42, 43, 49, 316 Viet Cong 222–4, 233–7, 246, 247
3
Sharpsburg, battle of (see also Antietam) 68 Vietnam War 217, 218, 222, 223, 230, 233–5, 237, 244–8,
4 Shays’ Rebellion 5, 9, 30, 316 264, 278–80, 288, 291, 293, 299
45 Shenandoah Valley Campaign 65 Virginia Resolution 5, 31, 32
46 Sherman Anti-Trust Act 94, 104, 109, 116, 120, 121,
47 124 Wade, Benjamin 18, 57, 96, 97, 318
48 Sherman Silver Purchase Act 94, 101, 117 Wagner Act (see also National Labor Relations Act) 158,
49222 Shiloh, Battle of 65, 67 162, 176, 178, 179
330 • INDEX
Wall Street Crash 130, 135, 151, 159, 165, 190 Wilson, Woodrow 104–6, 116, 117, 120–2, 127, 130, 134,
War of 1812 5, 12, 13 190, 193, 194, 201, 203–5, 207, 212–5, 218
Warren, Earl 256 Woodward, Bob 289, 298
Warsaw Pact 218, 220, 223 Works Progress Administration (WPA) 158, 161, 169,
Washington, Booker T. 249, 262–4, 268, 318 170, 177–9, 181, 188
Washington, George 1, 5, 6, 9–13, 16, 17, 21, 26, 28–30, Wounded Knee 100, 115
32, 318
Watergate 224, 237, 275, 276, 279, 280, 288–91, 293, ‘X’, Malcolm 250, 258, 264, 318
295
Whig Party 1, 39, 43, 54, 55, 57 Yalta Conference 218, 219, 227, 228, 242
Whiskey Rebellion 12, 30, 32 Young Plan 190, 196, 206
Wilderness, Battle of the 65, 69, 75
Wilmot Proviso 36, 45 Zimmerman Telegram 190, 202, 203, 215

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1111

Britain in the Twentieth Century

The United States, 1763–2000

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

ISBN 0-203-64210-4 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-67449-9 (Adobe eReader Format)

Part 1: Historical background

The approach of the historical background

Instructions in essay questions and what they mean

at all costs avoid a description of the two

Argument and support

Appropriate and inappropriate essay technique

Stages in the essay

How does this book combine the different approaches of the

Board Styles of answers Where located in chapters

OCR Essays (one-part) Chs 2, 6, 8

AQA Essays (one-part) AS (20) Chs 3, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11

Edexcel Essays (two-part) Chs 7, 9, 10

9 Empathy • To understand differing perspectives on issues. Chs 3, 9 and 10, Part 4.

10 Anticipating the • Historiography and the study of different Conclusion: Part 2.

The rise to power – ‘boom and bust’

The Cold War and beyond

The Struggle for the Constitution,

Historical background Sources

Introduction 1 The struggle to ratify the Constitution

The writing of the Constitution

Part 1: Historical background

The road to independence

The winning of independence and subsequent problems

Politics and constitutional disputes

1111 Figure 2.4

20111 LOUISIANA (1812) FLORIDA

An extract taken from the Annapolis Convention of 1786:

The Constitution in practice

1111 PRACTICE QUESTIONS

1 The struggle to ratify the Constitution

■ Source B: Extract from a petition against ratiﬁcation, presented to the Freemen of

■ Source C: Extract from speech by James Winthrop, Anti-Federalist of Massachusetts, 1787

ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE

Sources and references

1820 Missouri Compromise

The problems of territorial expansion and attempts at compromise

States’ rights and nationalism

R St. Paul WISCONSIN H I VT

Salt Milwaukee Detroit Buffalo CONN RI

San Francisco PENNSYLVANIA

TERRITORY COLORADO ILLINOIS A MD

Leadership: politicians and parties

Motives for secession and ﬁghting

1 Understanding the Northern perspective

■ Source C: New York Courier and Enquirer, 1 December 1860

■ Source D: Trenton Gazette, 3 January 1861

OCR QUESTION FORMAT

ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS IN THE OCR STYLE

2 Understanding the Southern perspective