1940s and 50s
Terms
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- Rosa Parks
- Civil rights protester who sparked a massive non-violent civil disobedient movement when she protested bus segregation by refusing to give up her seat to a white man
- Beats
- Non-conformist writers, such as Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, who expressed scorn against the middle-class ideals of conformity, religion, family values and materialism
- Fair Deal
- Agenda proposed by President Truman that included civil rights, national
- George F. Kennan
- American diplomat who, while living in Moscow, advised Truman that U.S. policy must be the "long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies"
- Jiang Jieshi
- battled Mao Zedong for the control of China
- Eisenhower Doctrine
- President Eisenhower's 1957 proclamation that the United States would send military aid and, if necessary, troops to any Middle Eastern nation threatened by "Communist aggression."
- Allen Dulles
- Director of CIA, appointed by Eisenhower. He was a veteran of wartime OSS cloak-and-dagger operations. He was also the brother of John Foster Dulles
- Duck and Cover
- exercise for schoolchildren; supposed protection from a atomic bomb
- Elvis Presley
- Popular rock and roll musician who melded his boyhood influence of Pentecostal music with the powerful beat and sexual energy of the rhythm-and-blues music
- Sphere of Influence
- geographical area of dominance or hegemony
- North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
- International organization of nations who signed the North Atlantic Treaty, establishing a mutual defense pact in which "an armed attack against one or more of them . . . shall be considered an attack against them all."
- Southern Manifesto
- Document signed by more than one hundred member of Congress, denouncing Brown v. Board of Education as "a clear abuse of judicial power."
- NSC-68
- Secret report completed by the National Security Council, emphasizing the Soviet Union's military strength and aggressive intentions
- Iron Curtain
- suggested by Churchill -- a line behind which the Soviets ere thwarting self-determination
- Unipolar
- a world dominated by one all-powerful nation
- Truman Doctrine
- Policy designed to contain by giving economic and military aid to Greece and Turkey in an effort to prevent those nations from falling under Soviet orbit
- Billy Graham
- Influential evangelist who peddled potent mixture of religious salvation and aggressive anticommunism
- President's Committee on Civil Rights
- Established by President Truman, this committee published a report that emphasized reasons for the government to enact federal legislation to end desegregation and the unfair treatment of African-Americans
- Marshall Plan
- The Truman administration's proposal for massive U.S. assistance for European
- John Foster Dulles
- Secretary of State under Dwight D. Eisenhower. He spoke of a holy war against "atheistic communism" and rejected the policy of containment
- Korean War
- War between North Korea and South Korea with heavy U.S. and Soviet involvement and each seeking to undermine the other with economic pressure
- Second Red Scare
- Post World War II resurgence of Anti-communist sentiment that influenced governmental and personal actions
- satellite nations
- nations bordering the Soviet Union under the control of the Soviet Union -- ruled by a puppet government
- domino theory
- Eisenhower's prediction that if Vietnam went communist, then Thailand, Burma, Indonesia, and ultimately all of Asia would fall like dominos
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
- African-American minister whose philosophy of civil disobedience fused the spirit of Christianity with the strategy of achieving racial justice by nonviolent resistance
- Alger Hiss and Whittaker Chambers
- Chambers, who was a former Soviet agent, identified Hiss to the House Un-American Activities Committee as an underground communist in the 1930s
- Joseph McCarthy
- Wisconsin senator who launched a campaign against Communism and the Soviet spies and sympathizers that he claimed were inside the federal government
- Employment Act of 1946
- Enacted by Truman, it committed the federal government to ensuring economic growth and established the Council of Economic Advisors to confer with the president and formulate policies for maintaining employment, production, and purchasing power
- McCarran Internal Security Act
- Act that which required organizations deemed communist by the attorney general to register with the Department of Justice and also authorized the arrest and detention of suspected spies during times of national emergency
- baby boom
- Period during the 1950s, during which an American baby was born every seven seconds. The immense size of the baby-boom generation (the 76 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964) ensured its impact and historical importance
- Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka
- Landmark court case that resulted in the Supreme Court deciding to outlaw racial segregation of public education facilities
- Sputnik
- The first artificial satellite, launched by the Soviet Union in 1957. Its launch dashed the American myth of unquestioned technological superiority
- GI Bill
- Bill of rights that guarenteed veterans to four years of education and job training, guidance and unemployment benefits, as well as establishing veterans' hospitals and provided low-interest home and farm loans
- Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
- Couple found guilty by a jury of conspiracy to commit espionage and sentenced to death. They protested their innocence until, claiming that they were victims of anti-Semitic and anti-Leftist sentiment
- Taft-Hartley Act
- Bill that barred the closed shop - a workplace where only union members could be hired - outlawed secondary boycotts, required union officials to sign loyalty oaths, and permitted the president to call a cooling-off period to delay any strike that might endanger national safety or health
- Earl Warren
- Supreme Court Chief Justice who incurred conservatives' wrath for defending the rights of persons accused of subversive beliefs
- Strom Thurmond
- 1948 States' Rights Democrat (Dixiecrat) canidate for the presidency
- National Security Act of 1947
- Act that unified the armed forces under a single Department of Defense
- Dr. Benjamin Spock
- Pediatrician and author of the Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care (1946), which emphasized children's need for the love and care of full-time mothers
- Containment
- Policy uniting military, economic, and diplomatic strategies to "contain" any further Soviet communist expansion and to enhance America's security and influence abroad
- military-industrial complex
- The aggregate of a nation's armed forces and the industries that supply their equipment, materials, and armaments
- Sunbelt
- Region of the United States that stretches from the old Confederacy across Texas to southern California
- House Un-American Activities Committee
- Committee that held hearings to expose communist influence in American life
- bracero program
- Wartime "temporary worker" measure that brought in seasonal farm laborers
- Dwight David Eisenhower
- President of United States from 1953 - 1961. He was known for his moderate politics, steering a middle course between Democratic liberalism and traditional Republican conservatism
- Mao Zedong
- Chinese military and political leader who established the People's Republic of China
- Berlin Airlift
- American program to deliver food and supplies to the children of the blockaded city of Berlin, Germany during World War II