Cold War, civil rights, and the Great Society.
Postwar boom, McCarthyism, the long civil rights movement, Vietnam, the women’s movement, and the conservative turn at the end of the 70s.
The Cold War (1945–1991) defined U.S. foreign policy: containment (Kennan, Truman Doctrine), Marshall Plan, NATO, Korea, the H-bomb arms race, Cuba (Bay of Pigs, Missile Crisis), Vietnam, détente. At home: McCarthyism, the GI Bill, suburbanization, the baby boom, the interstate highways, and an unprecedented economic expansion. The civil rights movement — Brown (1954), Montgomery (1955–56), Greensboro (1960), the March on Washington (1963), Civil Rights Act (1964), Voting Rights Act (1965), Selma — broke Jim Crow. LBJ’s Great Society launched Medicare, Medicaid, the War on Poverty, and federal aid to education. Then the consensus broke: Vietnam, urban riots, the assassinations of ’68, Nixon’s Southern Strategy, Watergate, stagflation, the Iran hostage crisis. By 1980, Reagan and the conservative coalition were in.
The CED, topic by topic.
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8.1
Contextualizing Period 8
From V-J Day to the Cold War’s start.
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8.2
The Cold War from 1945 to 1980
Containment, Marshall Plan, Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, détente.
WOR -
8.3
The Red Scare
HUAC, McCarthy, the Hollywood Ten, the Rosenbergs.
NAT · PCE -
8.4
Economy after 1945
GI Bill, suburbanization, baby boom, the long postwar expansion.
WXT -
8.5
Culture after 1945
Television, rock and roll, the Beats, conformity and dissent.
SOC · NAT -
8.6
Early Civil Rights (1940s–1950s)
Brown v. Board, Emmett Till, Montgomery, Little Rock, Greensboro sit-ins.
SOC · NAT -
8.7
America as a World Power
Vietnam War, escalation under LBJ, Tet, withdrawal, War Powers Act.
WOR -
8.8
The Great Society
Medicare, Medicaid, ESEA, Voting Rights Act, Immigration Act of 1965.
PCE · SOC -
8.9
The African American Civil Rights Movement (1960s)
Freedom Rides, Birmingham, MLK, Malcolm X, SNCC, Black Power.
SOC · NAT -
8.10
The Civil Rights Movement Expands
Chicano (UFW), AIM, Stonewall, second-wave feminism, disability rights.
SOC · NAT · MIG -
8.11
Youth Culture of the 1960s
Counterculture, antiwar protest, environmental movement, Earth Day 1970.
SOC · NAT
Connect to the bigger picture
Era: The Modern World
APWH cross-links: 8.1 Setting the Stage for the Cold War; 8.5 Decolonization After 1900
Next: Period 9 — A New Conservative Consensus
