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APUSH Unit 8: 1945-1980

The Cold War from 1945 to 1980

● The Soviet Union and the United States emerged from WWII as the two dominant world
powers, but the communist Soviet Union was upset about the ascendancy of the
democratic United States
● A cold war is a conflict between two belligerents in which neither engages in open
warfare with the other
○ More battle of ideologies than battle of violence
● The Russian Revolution in 1917 first alerted the US to communism and now the Soviet
Union was trying to spread communism throughout the world rather than contain its
beliefs like the US wanted
● Would the world be remade in the image of authoritarian communism or democratic
capitalism?
● Events sparking mutual suspicion and distrust between the US and the SU
○ After WWII, FDR (US), Stalin (SU), and Churchill (UK) agreed that eastern
European nations would choose their leaders through democratic elections at the
Yalta Conference but then the SU claimed eastern european nations as a “buffer
zone” between them and Germany
○ The US, SU, UK, and France agreed at the end of WWII to divide Germany and
Berlin into 4 occupation zones (Berlin was within the Soviet sector of Germany)
■ These divisions were a peacetime necessity but the Soviet’s portion
became another communist state
■ SU wanted to keep Germany weak to reduce its threat and extract
reparations from them, but western powers wanted to help Germany
become economically strong again for stable Europe
■ Winston Churchill’s said “an iron curtain has descended across the
continent”
● American response to spread of Soviets and communism
○ Containment
■ President Harry Truman issued the Truman Doctrine which advocated
the containment of communism by lending support to any country that
was threatened by Soviet communism
■ The Truman Doctrine was issued as a result of Soviet pressure on Turkey
and Greece to accommodate Soviet Goals
■ Congress agreed to spend $400 million to fend off Soviet pressure in
Turkey and Greece
○ The Marshall Plan
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■ The second part of the Truman Doctrine

■ Developed by Secretary of State Marshall
■ Allocated $13 billion to financially aid European countries to rebuild
■ The Soviets were also looking to support struggling nations, and the idea
behind that Marshall Plan was the countries with a firm economy could
choose democracy over communism
■ The plan succeed, which really upset Stalin
● Berlin was divided between the US, SU, UK, and France, and the city of Berlin was
within the SU portion of Germany (east Berlin SU, west Berlin US, UK, and France)
○ Since Berlin was within SU territory and because eastern powers kept west Berlin
alive with the hope of democracy, Stalin issued the Berlin Blockade in 1948 to
limit the ability of the United States, Great Britain and France to travel to the
western part of the city; Soviet blocked canals, roads, railways which western
powers used to supply western Berlin
○ Goal to absorb west Berlin as they did east Berlin into Soviet occupation
○ In response to the blockade, the US organized the Berlin Airlift in which 200,000
flights in US and allied airplanes carried US supplies into western Berlin and
prevented the Soviets from taking over
● In the North Atlantic Treaty Organization or NATO, members entered a military
alliance to resist any aggressive actions of the Soviet Union
● In response, the Soviets formed a counter-alliance called the Warsaw Pact which did the
same thing for communist nations of eastern Europe
● Nuclear Proliferation
○ Fierce arms race between the US and the Soviets
○ US developed the first atomic bomb in 1945 and Soviets infiltrated American
intelligence agencies and developed their first atomic bomb in 1949
○ Truman ordered the development of a more powerful Hydrogen Bomb which
was completed and tested in 1542 and the next year Soviets tested their first
hydrogen bomb
○ The US and Soviets were stockpiling increasing amounts of dangerous nuclear
bombs and the possibility of a nuclear war was very real
○ Both parties understood that although they could make bombs, they could never
use them because doing so could result in mutually assured destruction
● The Cold War was mainly an ideological battle but there were many proxy wars
○ The Vietnam War
○ The Korean War
■ Korea was a japanese colony before the end of WWII, after the war it was
divided along the 38th parallel
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■ Soviets administered North, US administered South

■ In June 1950 North Korea invaded South Korea with Soviet support
■ The UN sent troops of mainly American peacekeepers to support the
South and they pushed they near the border of China and China then sent
troops back below the 38th parallel
■ When the war ended, the situation was nearly identical to the situation at
the start of the war: divided along the 38th parallel with Soviets
controlling the North and Americans controlling the South
■ War illustrates two important points:
● Proxy war between US and Soviets
● Direct result of Truman’s containment policy

The Red Scare

● There were two Red Scares, the first after WWI and the second after WWII
● The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 was passed in response to massive waves of labor union
strikes across the nation and made it more difficult for workers to strike and made union
leaders pledge that they were not part of the communist party
● The Federal Employee Loyalty and Security Program was an executive order from
Truman passed in 1947 in which federal employees had to swear that they were not
communist or fascist and initiated federal investigations into the political affiliations of
workers
● The Un-American Activities Committee in the House of Representatives searched for
communist influence in American society, especially in Hollywood
○ Feared influence of film industry in spreading the message of communism
○ In 1947, the Hollywood Ten, 10 prominent Hollywood directions found to be
commuist, were called to testify in Congress, refused to go, and received short
prison sentences and spot on Hollywood blacklist, meaning they couldn’t work in
the industry again
● Senator Joseph McCarthy gave a speech in 1950 in which he claimed to have the
names of 205 known communists that had infiltrated the state department
○ Made Americans extremely paranoid that the nation was crawling with secret
communists
○ Busting these alleged communists became known as McCarthyism
○ McCarthy later admitted the real number was only 47 and never revealed them,
despite Senate meetings allowing him to do so
○ His sudden rise to fame resulted in just as a dramatic and rapid fall
● The Rosenberg Case
○ On August 29, 1949, the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb
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○ One couple with the last name Rosenberg were accused of leaking information
about America’s atomic bomb to the Soviets
○ The US government executed them both

Economy after 1945

● The economy in the 1950s was booming because of increased productivity following
WWII mobilization efforts and massive federal spending on infrastructure, most notably
the interstate highway system
● The Servicemen’s Readjustment Act (GI Bill) of 1944 gave veterans the opportunity to
go to college and take out low interest loans to buy houses and start businesses
● American’s were extensively reproducing during this period; from 1945-1960 50 million
people were born in the baby boom
● With new children and family, there was a demand for increased housing which took
place in the suburbs
○ The automobile made living in the suburbs possible
○ The white middle-class mainly were drawn to living in the suburbs and
commuting to work in their cars, leaving minorities and the poor in cities
○ Levittown was a suburban community built by William J. Levitt; purchased land
outside major cities and built mass-produced low-house homes organized in
sprawling identical lots
○ The Interstate Highway Act was passed in 1956
● There was also a mass migration to the Sun Belt states in the South and the West due to
the interstate highway system that made migration far easier
○ Mang GIs and their family came seeking opportunities in the defense industry
● Tax dollars for defense spending (important for Cold War) shifted to the Sun Belt states
and shifted political power from the Northeast and the Midwest to the South

Culture after 1945

● Mass culture is a widespread homogenous ideas and patterns of behavior to which many
Americans conformed
○ Pressure to conform came from McCarthyism
○ By the end of the 1950s, 90% of all American households had a television, which
provided a platform for the consumption of mass culture
■ Suburban sitcoms like Leave it to Beaver and Father Knows Best
presented the ideal American family
○ Rise of television was accompanied by the rise of the advertising industry
■ Middle class people had more disposable income so advertisers appealed
to people’s emotional needs of belonging and status
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■ Because advertisers promoted more items than Americans could purchase,

the credit card was developed so people could buy more than they could
afford and pay it off over time
○ Rock ‘n’ Roll music was another mediator of mass culture that grew exceedingly
popular among young people
■ Roots in black community with musicians like Chuck Berry but took on a
white face with music of Elvis Presley
● Some Americans challenges the mass culture of the age
○ The Beatniks or the Beat Generation Literary Movement were a group of poets
who rebelled against the conformity of the age through their poetry
■ Jack Kerouac’s book On The Road was a series of stream of
consciousness poems in free verse
○ J.D. Salinger wrote The Catcher in The Rye was a novel about a troubled and
cynical teenager named Holden Caulfield who had a profound distaste for
phoniness

Early steps in the civil rights movement, 1940s and 1950s

● During Reconstruction, many promises were made to black Americans securing voting
rights and equal protection under the law but through Jim Crow laws and voter
suppression tactics these promises were left unfulfilled
● All three branches of the federal government made gains with respect ot civil rights
○ President Truman issued executive order 9981 which banned segregation in the
US armed forces in 1948 at the request of the committee on civil rights
○ The Committee on Civil Rights created by Truman in 1946 and was taken by
examining civil rights issues in America and how to address those problems
■ Recommended desegregation of armed forces, abolishment of poll taxes,
and federal protection from lynching
■ Truman urged Congress to enact these measures into law
■ In 1962, Congress proposed the 24th amendment which abolished poll
taxes
○ Brown v. Board of Education was a landmark Supreme Court case ruled that
segregated schools violated the provisions of the 14th amendment’s equal
protection clause and overturned Plessy v. Ferguson in a unanimous ruling
■ The Court ruled that schools be integrated with “all deliberate speed” but
Southerners who opposed this measure used that phrase to stall
■ Southern representatives wrote the Southern Manifesto which argued that
the Supreme Court engaged in a gross abuse of power in the Brown
decision and shut schools down rather than have them integrated
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■ In 1956, Arkansas governor Orval Faubus called in the state’s national

guard to prevent black students from entering Little Rock High School;
these students became known as the Little Rock Nine and President
Isenhower sent federal troops to protect their entry
● In 1955, two white men brutally murdered African American teenager Emmett Till for
reportedly flirting with a white woman in the town of Money, Mississippi. Till's mother
held an open-casket funeral so that the world could see the violence that murderous
racists had inflicted on her son's body. The funeral drew over 100,000 mourners. Till's
murderers stood trial one month later, in a case that received a great deal of media
attention across the United States and the world. Both men were acquitted. Till's death,
and the acquittal of his murderers, laid bare the savagery of racism in the United States
and served as an inspiration to a generation of civil rights activists.

America as a world power

● After WWII ended, there was a massive movement of decolonization throughout the
world
○ Major empires in Africa, Asia, and Latin America crumbled
● Since the US wanted to remake the world in the image of democratic capitalism and the
Soviet Union wanted to remake the world in the image of authoritarian communism, they
were eager to influence the government of these new nations
○ New countries had unstable form of self-government and needed aid
○ Desired and valuable assets in the conflict between the US and the Soviets
● Guatemala
○ In 1954 the US helped Guatemalans overthrow a socialist government that was
encroaching on US business interests
○ Guatemalans elected Jacobo Árbenz to be their leader in 1951, but he was
socialist which upset Americans
○ He nationalized some of the land on which the American United Fruit Company
grew their bananas; he wanted to nationalize land that was not under cultivation
and distribute it to impoverished Guatemalans and even offered to buy the land
○ In response, the CIA came in and overthrew Árbenz and established a military
dictatorship
● Cuba
○ Military dictatorship that subject to will of US under Platt Amendment from
Spanish-American War
○ In 1959, Fidel Castro overthrew the government and became the political leader
of Cuba
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○ Castro was a communist and Cuba’s proximity to the US now was an issue of
concern
○ To remedy this issue, Eisenhower initiated a campaign for the US to train and arm
a group of Cuba exiles who disliked the Cuban regime in order to overthrow the
Castro regime
○ The invasion was carried out once John F. Kennedy became president in 1961
○ The Bay of Pigs Invasion was a massive failure and invaders were promptly
killed or captured by Castro’s troops
○ This botched overthrow led to further alienation of US from Cuba and further
communist embrace of Cuba and the Soviet Union
○ In 1963, the Cuban Missile Crisis took place; US intelligence agencies
discovered Soviet-style launch weapons being stockpiled in Cuba
■ Concerning because ability of the Soviet Union to launch missile was
uncertain but ability of Cuba to do so was certain
■ The US had done the same thing by stockpiling nuclear weapons in
Turkey
■ After intense negotiation, Soviets stood down and crisis was averted
● Iran
○ In 1953, the CIA conceived and implemented a plot to overthrow the
democratically elected prime minister to return the Shah Mohammad Reza
Pahlavi to the throne
○ The US was motivated to do this because the democratic prime minister wanted to
nationalize Iran’s oil industry and take firmer control over it, and the US and other
western nations had grown dependent on Iran’s oil
○ The Shah was extremely friendly with the United States and had no problem
supplying them with oil
● French colony of Indochina also known as Vietnam
○ Indochina was decolonized and divided along the 17th parallel until an election
could be held
○ In the north, communism took holder under Ho Chi Minh Indochina while the
south remained democratic
○ Under leadership of Eisenhower, a billion dollars was given to the South
Vietnamese people to preserve their democratic government and stay
economically stable
○ Eisenhower believed in the domino theory which held that if South Vietnam fell
to communism, it would spread to other countries in the region and soon
communism would be widespread
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○ Eisenhower was opposed to the military-industrial complex, meaning our

growing relationship between the military and our industrial capacity which had
been producing arms for the Cold War arms race and other conflicts
○ Thought it would be tempting to make policy decisions concerning military
interventions based on economic interest and material interests of those who
produced the weaponry

The Vietnam War

● Vietnam was divided into a north (communism under Ho Chi Minh) and a south
(democratic with ties to US) after being decolonized
● Under domino effect, preventing communism in Vietnam was critical to avoiding other
nations falling to communism
● US foreign policy in the Cold War was largely devoted to containment
● John F. Kennedy replaced Eisenhower in office in 1961 and agreed with the domino
theory, so sent 16,000 US military “advisors” into South Vietnam who were there to
support the South Vietnam
● In 1963, Kennedy was assassinated and Lyndon B. Johnson became president
● Gulf of Tonkin Incident
○ North Vietnam fired on a US battleship in the Gulf of Tonkin
○ Johnson used this incident to justify US military involvement in the region
○ Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution on August 7, 1964, allowing him
to intervene militarily in Vietnam to protect American interests
■ Not declaration of war
○ Some military engagement did ensue, which led to a huge debate over whether the
President overstepped his power as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy.
● US had 16,000 “military advisors” stationed in the region and North Vietnam sent 40,000
troops to fight in South Vietnam
● Johnson’s strategy was step-by-step escalation and by 1965, 200,000 American troops
were fighting in Vietnam and by 1967, 400,000 US troops were engaged in conflict in
Vietnam
● North Vietnam was more adept at fighting than the US had predicted so the US got much
more involved in the war than anticipated
● Thousands of Americans dying in a war to which they weren’t morally connected and
that was never officially declared by Congress
● Johnson administration believed that with just a little more escalation, the US would
triumph over Vietnam so they misinformed the American public to keep support for the
war effort up
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● Johnson’s claims contradicted by the portrayal of the Vietnam War on TV, creating a
credibility gap
● The Tet Offensive was a massive surprise attack carried out by the North Vietnamese
which inflicted heavy casualties on US troops, but the US counter-attacked and inflicted
heavier casualties on the Vietcong
● Johnson asked for 200,000 more troops for Vietnam and was denied, so escalation ended
there
● When Richard Nixon was elected in 1968 president in his goal was to reduce US
involvement in the war without looking like we had conceded defeat
○ Vietnamization provided for the removal of US troops of Vietnam while
providing financial aid and arms and training programs to carry out war efforts
○ Nixon ended war in 1975

Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society

● Lyndon Johnson was working to correct societal ills at home in a series of programs
called the Great Society, which was just an extension of FDR’s New Deal
● The Great Society sought to abolish poverty in the US by creating a series of programs
mirroring the limited welfare state created under the New Deal
● Like FDR, Johnson was a Democrat and had a Democratic-majorty Congress to pass
domestic programs
● The Office of Economic Opportunity created self-help programs like literacy instruction
and vocational training to impoverished Americans
○ Programs had limited success because eradicating poverty needed more attention
than Johnson could give, especially with growing conflict in Vietnam
● Medicare Program provided federally funded health insurance for people 65+
● Medicaid Program provided federally funded health insurance for those in poverty
● Abolished immigration quotas, providing new opportunities for America-seeking
immigrants
● Liberalism in America was enjoying its golden age, united by anti-communist sentiment
abroad and belief in vigorous government intervention to right the wrongs of society
● The Warren Court, headed by chief justice Earl Warren, made decisions greatly
expanding liberalism from 1953 to 1969
○ Gideon v. Wainwright (1963) that incorporated the 6th Amendment’s right to
legal counsel to the states
○ Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) ensured access to birth control
○ Engel v. Vitale (1962) ruled that prayer in public schools was unconstitutional
○ Baker v. Carr (1962) made the “one person, one vote” standard
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The African American Civil Rights Movement, 1960s

● On December 1, 1955, a black woman named Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery,
Alabama for refusing to give up her bus seat so that white passengers could sit in it. Rosa
Parks’s arrest sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott, during which the black citizens of
Montgomery refused to ride the city’s buses in protest over the bus system’s policy of
racial segregation. Following a November 1956 ruling by the Supreme Court that
segregation on public buses was unconstitutional, the bus boycott ended successfully.
● Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist minister who endorsed nonviolent civil
disobedience, emerged as leader of the Boycott and ascended to power as one of the most
powerful voices for civil rights.
● The Sit-In Movement was spurred by a younger generation of civil rights activists in
which protestors would sit at “whites-only” lunch counters and demand service and were
met with mass arrests
○ These events were shown to the general public in newspapers and led to a change
in policy
● In 1963, MLK and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) launched
another campaign in Montgomery to end racial segregation through peaceful protests in
the city
○ Public safety commissioner called Bull Connor would not tolerate such
demonstrations
○ Under Connor’s direction, city police used high-pressure fire hoses, police dogs,
and other brutal methods to disperse the crowds
○ These same brutal tactics were used in the children’s crusade on young kids and
this turned the tide in favor of civil rights protestors as these horrific atrocities
were shown on TV
● The March of Washington in 1963
○ 200,000 civil rights activists gathered in Washington
○ King delivered the I Have A Dream Speech in which King expressed his desire
for a society defined by equality
○ Fought for passage of Civil Rights Act of 1964 in Congress
● Malcolm X thought separatism and militarism, rather than integration with white society,
was the way to freedom
● Rise of militant groups like the Black Panthers to secure black rights through violent
● The Civil Rights Act of 1964 made discrimination of the basis of race, religion, or sex
illegial
● The Voting Rights Act of 1965 prohibited racial discrimination in the voting booth by
outlawing literacy tests and poll taxes and authorized the federal government to oversee
voting in countries with historically low black voter turnout
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● Supreme Court ruled on cases expanding civil rights

○ Loving v. Virginia (1967) made interracial marraige legal
● In 1968, MLK was assassinated
● Race riots erupted in many cities across the US

The Civil Rights Movement expands

● Women’s Movement
○ Cultural norms of the 1950s taught women that their place was in the home and
their job was to made the home a haven of rest for their husband and children
○ In 1963, Betty Friedan published the Feminine Mystique explored the
borderline imprisonment of the typical suburban housewife who was slave to the
needs of her family over her own needs
■ By 1964, the Feminine Mystique sold over a million copies
○ In 1966, the National Organization for Women (NOW) advocated for women’s
rights using the same tactics deployed by members of the civil rights movement to
secure equal opportunity and equal pay for women entering professional careers
○ Ms. Magazine created by Gloria Steinem was another popular feminist literary
work
○ This resulted in Title IX of the Educational Amendments on 1972 which
banned discrimiation on the basis of gender in education and secured women’s
funding for women’s sports teams on high school and college level
○ There was a big push to add the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) to the
Constitution, so it couldn’t get overturned; goal to prevent discrimination on the
basis of sex
■ Conservative woman Phyllis Schlafly led a movement called STOP (Stop
Taking Our Privileges) ERA and the amendment wasn’t ratified
■ The “privileges” referred to dependent wife benefits for social security,
separate bathrooms for men and women, and exemption from the military
draft
○ Feminists also participated in the counterculture movement of the 1960s and the
sexual revolution which changed American attitudes toward sexuality and sexual
expression → widespread use of birth control and antibiotics, made casual sex the
norm
○ In Roe v. Wade (1973), women were given the right to an abortion on the right to
privacy in the 14th amendment’s due process clause
● Latinos
○ During the 50s and 60s, Mexican workers came to America to work its fields and
were paid a pitiful amount
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○ Activists Cesar Chavez and Delores Huerta created the United Farm Workers
in 1962 to protest interests of migrant farm workers
○ Staged national boycott of grapes to pressure farm owners to increase their pay
○ By 1970, their efforts were rewarded with increased wages
● American Indians
○ The goal of the American Indian Movement of 1968 was to reclaim their
heritage and tribal traditions that had been lost to American culture, achieve
self-determination, and address poverty
○ In the Occupation of Alcatraz Island, the abandoned federal prison was taken
over by natives in 1968 since they received any abandoned federal lands
○ The occupation ended after 19 months when the federal government made it
difficult for the natives to live there
○ The Self-Determination Act of 1975 gave natives greater control over their land,
education, and law enforcement
● Gay Liberation Movement
○ 1969 raid on a New York gay bar called the Stonewall Inn
○ In the 1970s, homosexuality was changed from a mental illness to a sexual
orientation

Youth culture of the 1960

● Two college organizations sprang up in the 1960s with opposing opinions on US
involvement in the Vietnam War
○ Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) was conservative and supported
American involvement in Vietnam because it mean the containment of
communism
○ Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) released their beliefs in the Port
Huron Statement which stressed participatory democracy and direct government
action
● These college students cared about Vietnam because once they graduated, they would be
drafted and sent to fight in an “immoral” war
● Hence, students engaged in massive anti-war demonstrations across the country
○ Kent State Massacre
■ College students were protesting the latest escalation in Vietnam as per
President Nixon and engaged in acts of looting and vandalism
■ Nixon sent the National Guard to keep the peace
■ The National Guard tried to disperse protests but they refused to leave and
hurled rocks at the National Guard
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■ One National Guardsman opened fire on the students and 4 died and 10
injured
● The counterculture movement sought to cast off societal restraint and overturn societal
norms with rebellious clothes and drugs
○ The hippie became the image of the counterculture movement
○ In San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury District, hippies gathered into a community
based on counter cultural ideals, drug use, and music
○ Used marijuana and psychedelic drugs like LSD which created the unification of
the movement
○ In the sexual revolution, it became increasingly normal to engage in casual sex
and multipe partners
○ As opposed to fine-tuned, pristine voice of Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan was popular
in this era
○ At the Woodstock Music Festival, 400,00 people were in attendance
○ By the 1970s, counterculture fizzled out due to excessive drug use
○ Entire movement critique on past generations

The environment and natural resources from 1968 to 1980

● The US was heavily dependent on oil, much of which came from the Middle East
● Aarab nations opposed creation of Israel in 1948 but the US was an ally of Israel
● Oil-producing Arab nations formed the Organization of Petroleum Exporting
Countries (OPEC) to better control the prices of oil they exported and in 1973 they
dramatically reduced oil exports to America and raised the price on oil that they did
export
○ Fuel prices rose dramatically in the US and there was a fuel shortage
● Led to a conversation about alternative forms of energy for the US
○ Nuclear energy required uranium, which was plentiful and cheap, and produced
no greenhouse gases
○ Americans began to fear the effects of radiation caused by nuclear energy
■ In 1973, one of the the nuclear reactors on Three Mile Island in PA
melted down partially and radioactive waste was released into the
surrounding environment
■ Nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl in the Soviet union
● The Environmental Movement
○ In Silent Spring, Rachel Carson explained how modern society was poisoning the
Earth, especially in regards to pesticides in modern agriculture
○ The first Earth Day in 1970 gave the Environmental Movement a lot of exposure
○ Focused on the dangerous of nuclear energy
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● In 1970, President Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to

manage pollution control programs and pesticides, oversee the regulation of polluting
companies, and much more
○ Americans were in support of this act largely due to their exposure to
environmental hazards, like the Ohio River that caught river because it was so
pollutants and environmental harm by pesticides
● The Clean Air Act of 1963 was aimed at controlling air pollution on a national scale,
when the EPA was created in 1970 it took over the work of that policy

Society in transition
● Crowning achievement of conservatism came with the election of Ronald Regan in 1980
● Conservatives in the 1960s and 1970s were infuriated at the cultural shifts happening
(protests of Vietnam war, traditional familial structure changing, gains made by civil
rights)
● The Young Americans for Freedom was a movement of conservative college students
who were instrumental in the campaign of Barry Goldwater for president in 1964
● Goldwater coined the phrase The New Right which was a coalition of conservatives who
resisted the onslaught of liberalism, retained their religious values, were openly populist,
and anti-egalitarian (i.e. thought men and women had their designated spheres)
● The John Birch Society opposed communism and advocated for limited government
○ Spewed out conspiracy theories, like how the government putting fluoride into the
water would made us subservient to them via mass medicine
● More moderate conservatism represented by William F. Buckley and magazine called
the National Review denounced the John Birch Society
● The Religious Right included a large group of conservative christians who opposed the
liberal and progressive agenda and were enraged over Roe v. Wade
● Jerry Falwell founded the Moral Majority and closely melded Christanity with
conservative politics
○ Held “I Love America” rallies and violated separation of Church and State
● Rise of James Dobson’s Focus on the Family radio program argued for the
reintroduction of prayer into schools and to resist the expansion of gay rights
● Oil crisis + stagflation (inflation combined with economic stagnation) = 1970 recession
○ Nixon attempted to remedy this by cutting federal spending, but this worsened the
crisis and reduced trust in the government
● The Watergate Scandal
○ Nixon (R) reelected in 1972 and men hired by his reelection committee were
caught breaking into the Watergate Office Complex which house the Democratic
headquarters trying to bug phones and steal documents
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○ Nixon denied any knowledge of this, but in actuality he knew and endorsed this
○ Nixon resigned rather than be impeached
● Conservatives and liberals clashed over Affirmative Action
● Bakke v. University of California
○ Bakke was denied admission to UCLA and argued that he was being
discriminated against for being white
○ In 1978, the Court ruled that minority quotas were unconstitutional and violated
Equal Protection Clause of 14th amendment but still allowed race to play a part in
decisions