Chapter 30- Conservative America in the Ascent Flashcards
A 1960 book that set forth an uncompromising conservatism and inspired a Republican grassroots movement in support of its author, Barry Goldwater.
The Conscience of a Conservative
A conservative magazine founded by editor William F. Buckley in 1955, who used it to criticize liberal policy.
National Review
Politically active religious conservatives, especially Catholics and evangelical Christians, who became particularly vocal in the 1980s against feminism, abortion, and homosexuality and who promoted “family values.”
Religious Right
Crisis that began in 1979 after the deposed shah of Iran was allowed into the United States following the Iranian revolution. Iranians broke into the U.S. embassy in Teheran and took 66 Americans hostage. The hostage crisis lasted 444 days and contributed to President Carter’s reelection defeat.
hostage crisis
A coalition supporting Ronald Reagan that included the traditional core of Republican Party voters, middle class suburbanites and migrants to the Sunbelt states, blue collar Catholics, and a large contingent of southern whites, an electorally key group of former Democrats that had been gradually moving toward the Republican Party since 1964.
Reagan coalition
A political organization established by evangelist Jerry Falwell in 1979 to mobilize conservative Christian voters on behalf of Ronald Reagan’s campaign for president.
Moral Majority
Blue collar Catholics from industrialized midwestern states such as Michigan, Ohio, and Illinois who were dissatisfied with the direction of liberalism in the 1970s and left the Democratic Party for the Republicans.
Reagan Democrats
Economic theory that tax cuts for individuals and businesses encourage investment and production and stimulate consumption because individuals can keep more of their earnings. In reality, supply-side economics created a massive federal budget deficit.
supply-side economics
Legislation introduced by President Reagan and passed by Congress in 1981 that authorized the largest reduction in taxes in the nation’s history.
Economic Recovery Tax Act
The cumulative total of all budget deficits.
national debt
The limiting of regulation by federal agencies. Deregulation of prices in the trucking, airline, and railroad industries had begun under President Carter in the late 1970s, and Reagan expanded it to include cutting back on government protections of consumers, workers, and the environment.
deregulation
A deadly disease that killed nearly 100,000 people in the United States in the 1980s.
HIV/AIDS
Term that includes food, beverage, and tourist industries, financial and medical service industries, and computer technology industries, which were the leading sectors of U.S. growth in the second half of the 1980s. This pattern represented a shift from the heavy reliance on the heavy industries of steel, autos, and chemicals.
service industries
The democratically elected group in Nicaragua that President Reagan accused of threatening U.S. business interests. Reagan attempted to overthrow them by ordering the CIA to assist and armed opposition group called the Contras.
Sandinistas
An opposition group in Nicaragua that President Reagan ordered the CIA to assist. While congress banned the CIA and all other government agencies from providing any military support to the Contras, a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Marines, Oliver North, used the profits from the Iranian arms deal to assist the Contras, resulting in the Iran-Contra affair.
Contras
