American Pageant: Chapters 27-29

Competition, breaking up monopolies, lower tariffs, and banking reform. Roosevelt’s rival plan was the New Nationalism.

The Republican vote split between Taft and Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party.

Lowered tariffs and included a graduated income tax.

A federal income tax.

A central banking system of regional Federal Reserve banks overseen by a board, with a more flexible currency.

An agency to investigate and stop unfair business practices.

Strengthened antitrust law and exempted labor unions from being treated as trusts.

An eight-hour day for railroad workers.

Restrict child labor. The Supreme Court struck it down in 1918.

A progressive lawyer Wilson named to the Supreme Court in 1916, its first Jewish justice.

His administration segregated many federal offices.

The U.S. could act as an international police power in the Western Hemisphere.

Encouraging U.S. investment abroad to promote stability and American influence.

A promise to support democracy and avoid exploitation, though he intervened often in Latin America.

It opened in 1914, linking the Atlantic and Pacific. Roosevelt had backed Panama’s 1903 independence from Colombia.

After the Tampico incident during the Mexican Revolution, to pressure dictator Huerta, whom Wilson refused to recognize.

Villa raided Columbus, New Mexico. Pershing’s expedition failed to capture him.

Haiti (1915) and the Dominican Republic (1916).

Eventual independence for the Philippines.

Provided farmers with low-interest rural credit.

“He kept us out of war.” He asked Congress for war in April 1917.

To make the world “safe for democracy.”

Germany promised to stop sinking merchant and passenger ships without warning. It broke the pledge in early 1917.

Set up a draft. About 2 million Americans served in Europe, Black soldiers mostly in segregated units.

Coordinated and prioritized industrial production for the war.

Voluntary conservation, like meatless and wheatless days (“Hooverizing”).

Conserved coal and oil through measures like daylight saving time and heatless Mondays.

Collective bargaining and the eight-hour day, which helped unions grow during the war.

Liberty Bonds and higher taxes.

Punished interfering with the war effort and criticizing the government, draft, or military.

A Socialist leader sentenced to ten years under the Espionage Act for an antiwar speech. Harding commuted it in 1921.

Renaming foods (sauerkraut became “liberty cabbage”), banning German in schools, and attacks on German Americans.

They filled industrial jobs, and their contribution helped build momentum for the 19th Amendment (1920).

Mostly in segregated units, many in labor duty. Some served in combat with French forces.

Loans and trade to the Allies far outpaced those to the Central Powers.

Germany shifted troops to the Western Front, making fresh American troops crucial for the Allies.

Escorted merchant ships sailed in groups, sharply cutting submarine losses.

The U.S. army under General Pershing, kept as a distinct force instead of merged into Allied units.

Early major U.S. actions in 1918 that helped halt Germany’s last offensive.

The largest American operation of the war, helping push Germany toward the armistice.

November 11, 1918 (the armistice). The Treaty of Versailles came in June 1919.

Wilson (U.S.), Lloyd George (Britain), Clemenceau (France), and Orlando (Italy).

Peoples should choose their own governments. It led to new nations in Eastern Europe.

Article 231 made Germany accept responsibility for the war, justifying reparations.

Territorial losses, heavy reparations, military limits, and the war guilt clause.

Members pledged to defend each other against aggression. Opponents feared it would drag the U.S. into wars and limit Congress’s war powers.

Irreconcilables opposed the treaty entirely. Reservationists, led by Lodge, would accept it with changes, especially to Article X.

He suffered a stroke in 1919 and refused compromise. The Senate never ratified.

Many saw it as radical, Bolshevik-style disorder. Governor Calvin Coolidge became famous for firing the strikers.

Steel and other strikes plus violent race riots in many cities, adding to postwar fear and unrest.

Peace and quiet and a retreat from wartime activism and idealistic crusades.

Vice President Calvin Coolidge became president and won election in 1924.

“The business of America is business”: limited regulation and low taxes.

Tax cuts, especially for the wealthy and corporations, and reducing the national debt.

Raised tariffs to protect American industry, making it harder for Europe to repay war debts.

Limited battleship tonnage among major naval powers.

Restructured German reparations, with U.S. loans helping Germany pay the Allies.

A treaty that “outlawed” war but had no enforcement mechanism.

No. The U.S. stayed out of the League but pursued arms limits, debt and reparations diplomacy, and economic ties.

Herbert Hoover beat Al Smith, a Catholic Democrat, amid prosperity and anti-Catholic prejudice.

Assembly-line production made cars affordable, and credit let people buy cars and appliances.

It boosted steel, rubber, and oil, spread suburbs, increased mobility, and loosened social norms.

It linked products to status and desire, building a consumer ethic (Bruce Barton was a leading ad man).

They created a shared national mass culture and celebrities like Lindbergh and Babe Ruth.

He flew solo across the Atlantic in 1927 and became a national hero.

Overproduction and falling crop prices after wartime demand dropped.

Widely violated, it fueled speakeasies and organized crime (Al Capone) and was repealed in 1933.

Blacks, Catholics, Jews, and immigrants, with strong membership in the Midwest as well as the South. It declined after scandals.

Fear of immigrants and radicals. Two Italian anarchists were convicted amid controversy and executed in 1927.

Limited immigration by nationality quotas, setting up the stricter 1924 law.

The 1924 law set no quotas for the Western Hemisphere, so Mexican immigration rose.

A movement for literal belief in the Bible, opposed to teaching evolution. It clashed with modern science in the Scopes Trial.

Changing gender norms, with new styles and more social freedom for young women.

They could vote, but gains in political power were limited. More women worked, mostly in low-paid jobs.

A leading advocate of birth control.

Ideas about the subconscious and sexuality encouraged more open attitudes and changing morals.

Writers like Fitzgerald and Hemingway, disillusioned by the war and critical of materialism.

The Great Gatsby.

Middle-class conformity and small-town materialism (Main Street, Babbitt).

Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Bessie Smith.

Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Claude McKay, and Countee Cullen.

Uneven wealth, heavy consumer debt, struggling farmers, and stock speculation, including buying on margin.