Chapter 12
Politics of the 1920's
Nicknames of the 1920's
The Roaring Twenties
Times were great
Republican Era
Almost all republican presidents
The Jazz Age
Jazz took off in the 20's
The Lost Generation (1883-1900)
Boom to Bust
Decade of Normalcy
Brought the focus to America
Prosperity Decade
Prohibition Era
The Advertising Age
Advertising became popular
Target audience was women
Radio, Newspaper, etc.
Golden Age of Sports
Sports took off
Era of Permanent Prosperity
"If it looks too good to be true, it probably is."
Key Topics
Red Scare
Immigration
Republican Philosophy
Impact of Automobiles
Women's Rights
Prohibition
Entertainment
Stock Market Crash
Red Scare (1919- 1920)
-The fear of a communist takeover
Communism
Karl Marx & Frederick Ingles
Founded communism
Karl Marx hated capitalism because of income inequality
Practice vs Theory
China , Cuba, Vietnam, North Korea, Laos
Soviet Union was the mother of Communist Countries
Vladimir Lenin (1917-1924)
Practice- The Government has all the power and control every aspect of peoples' lives
Karl Marx's Theory- people would revolt against the wealthy and create a society where all people worked together as equals
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
(USSR) Soviet Union
Vladimir Lenin (1917-1924)
A Marxist
He wanted to guide the country back to prosperity then dissolve the government
Joseph Stalin (
Tried to advance his own power
Equality in poverty
The Palmer Raids
Mitchell Palmer
J. Edgar Hoover
The raids were a series of raids conducted by the department of Justice to capture and arrest suspected radicals and deport them from the United States
The raids and arrests occurred in November 1919 and January 1920 under the leadership of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer and J. Edgar Hoover
Raids started after there were strikes that got national attention
Race Riots in more than 20 cities
Two sets of Mail Bombings in April and June 1919 - One bomb was mailed to Palmer's home
More than 500 foreign citizens were deported during the raids
Sacco and Vanzetti
In 1920, two men robbed and murdered a paymaster and his guard as they transferred $15,776 from the slater and Morrill Shoe factory
Due to the anti-immigrant, anti-communist times of the Red Scare, two Italian immigrants and known anarchists, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, were accused and arrested for the crime, despite little evidence against them
Sacco and Vanzetti were convicted on circumstantial evidence of capital murder and sentenced to death
Sacco and Vanzetti appealed their convictions but lost and were executed in 1927 by firing squad
Immigration
Immigrants were not liked
Immigrants took jobs and kept wages low
The Immigration Act of 1924 (National Origins Act/ Asian Exclusion Act) greatly reduced immigration to US
The law was aimed at restricting immigration of Southern Europeans, Eastern Europeans and Jews
Severely restricted the immigration of Africans and prohibited the immigration of Arabs, East Asians, and Indians
The purpose of the act was “to preserve the ideal of American homogeneity”
W. A. S. P
White Anglo Saxon Protestant
President Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover (Republican)
Harding participated in lots of scandals
Albert Fall - Teapot dome scandal
Teapot dome is a rock in wyoming containing the navy’s oil wells
He was paid off by a company to drill for oil
Harding was the first president to go to alaska
Harding dies suddenly and Calvin Coolidge becomes president
Republican Philosophy - (1920’s)
Conservatism
Low taxes, high tariffs (import tax), and less government
Lower immigration
Trickle-down theory
Helping businesses trickles down and increases job opportunities and wages
Laissez-faire
Government will stay out of business
Rugged individualism
You are in charge of your life and success
A return to “Normalcy”
Liberalism
Automobiles (1920’s)
Vacation
Sports
Dates
Movies
Airplanes (1920’s)
Mail
Transportation of small groups of people
Military
Entertainment
Major feats
Rural vs Urban
1920 census- 51,2 people lived in cities of 2,500 or more
1922-1929- more than 2 million people moved from farms to the cities each year
Rural areas tried to hold on to moral values and close social relationships
Cities tolerated drinking, gambling, and casual dating
Prohibition
18th Amendment (1920-1933)
The manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcoholic beverages was illegal
Supporters believed alcohol brought about corruption, crime, wife and child abuse, and accidents
Alcohol was allowed for medicinal and religious purposes
The volstead Act created the Prohibition Bureau to enforce the law
Prohibition failed for three reasons:
People despised it. Saw it as government meddling in people’s lives
The Prohibition Bureau was underfunded. Had 1,500 people to supervise the country
Organized crime became commonplace
“The Noble Experiment”
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