Post-War America Flashcards
Segregation laws/social prejudice.
- ‘Jim Crow Laws’
- Threat of violence if African Americans tried to vote (police often took part.)
- White teachers earned 30% more.
- Some whites believed in equality but afraid to lose privileged way of life.
What was the American Dream?
- Prosperity-America produced 1/2 world’s goods.
- Suburban homes.
- Advertisements/consumerism.
- Hire purchase.
- Domestic goods.
What was McCarthyism?
- Red scare.
- HUAC investigated possible communists/Hollywood stars questioned.
- Senator McCarthy claimed to have list of communists working in govt.
- Set up own committee to investigate/hearings shown on live TV. No proof.
- People called him a bully when he started accusing people in army and he gave USA bad reputation.
Popular Culture.
🔵Teenagers-more spending money, had own style and culture. James Dean ‘Rebel Without a Cause.’
🔵Rock and Roll-Elvis Presley, teenage discontent.
🔵Television-Sponsors and advertisements.
Sense of national American culture developed.
What were the civil rights groups?
-SCLC, formed by MLK, non-violent.
-SNCC, African Americans and white American students, non-violent.
CORE
What was The March on Washington?
- MLK.
All African Americans to achieve right to vote.
Over 250,000 people marched to Washington.
Pressure Kennedy into introducing a civil rights bill.
‘I have a dream.’
Impact on public opinions.
No trouble/litter-peaceful.
What were the Greensboro Sit-ins?
- SNCC.
Woolworths had lunch counter with chairs only for whites.
African American students sat in these seats and refused to leave.
Within a week 400 students were organising sit-ins. Spread to other cities.
By end of year lunch counters had been desegregated in 126 cities.
Sit-ins in restaurants, libraries, churches.
What was Brown v Board of Education?
- NAACP.
Linda Brown had to cross rail track on journey to school rather than attend all-whites school nearby.
NAACP brought court case against Topeka board of education and won in 1954.
Justice Warren stated segregated schools could not be equal and ordered Southern states to set up integrated schools.
Little Rock Arkansas?
- 3 years after BvB Arkansas had not integrated schools.
Supreme Court ordered Governor of Arkansas (Faubus) to let 9 African Americans attend white school but he ordered state troops to avoid them attending because he ‘could not guarantee their safety.’ Backed down when Eisenhower sent troops for 6 weeks to protect students. 1 graduated.
What were freedom rides?
- CORE, SNCC.
Many states still hadn’t desegregated buses.
Freedom riders rode buses in Birmingham to highlight this.
Faced violent reaction, 200 arrested.
JFK stepped in to stop violence and arrests.
Civil rights campaigners had shown they were no longer prepared to be intimidated.
Selma, Alabama?
- MLK.
KING’s priority was to get African Americans voting so organised voting rights march through Selma. Had a racist sheriff, Jim Clark.
Authorities banned march 600 did it anyway and were brutally attacked.
TV pictures of violence horrified America.
King led a token March which turned back after a short distance.
Montgomery Bus Boycott?
1955-1965. MIA (MLK.)
Rosa Parks refused to give up bus seat for white person and was arrested.
MIA was formed to boycott buses. On first day buses were empty and over 10,000 listened to MLK speech. Bus company lost 65% income.
Carpool organised.
1956 Supreme Court ruled bus segregation illegal.
Failures of Montgomery bus boycott?
1955-1956. King arrested twice. Churches and homes set on fire. Integrated buses shot at by snipers. Carpool declared illegal by local judges.
Assassination of Martin Luther King.
- Caused insecurity and frustration among those who watched development.
Law might have changed, but had attitudes changed with it?
Malcolm X and the black power movement.
1960s. Nation of Islam Malcolm X.
Black nationalists-critical of MLK’s methods-separate black state.
Assassinated 1965.
SNCC radical when Carmicheal elected chairman 1966, talked in terms of black power.
Black panthers had around 2,000 members, believed they should arm themselves and force white people to give them equality, killed 9 officers between 1967-1969.
