POSTWAR SOCIETY AND CULTURE: CHANGE AND ADJUSTMENT

1. POSTWAR SOCIETY AND CULTURE: CHANGE AND ADJUSTMENT • Closing the Gates to New Immigrants • xenophobia did not cease with the passing of the Red Scare • as millions of Europeans attempted to flee their continent’s devastation, Congress acted to bar their entry into the United States

2. bowing to nativist pressures, especially against southern and eastern Europeans, Congress established entry quotas based on national origin • Congress restricted overall immigration to a maximum of 150,000 in 1929 • dislike of the new immigrants, many of whom were Jewish, was related to a general growth of anti-Semitism

3. New Urban Social Patterns • the 1920 census revealed, for the first time, that urban Americans (defined as those living in a community of 2,500 or more) outnumbered rural Americans • city life affected family structure, employment, and educational and cultural opportunities • ethnic background, socioeconomic status, and family size played significant roles in determining whether women worked outside the home and, if they did work, women's work patterns

4. compulsory education laws and child labor legislation limited the number of children working • new ideas about family life, such as companionate marriage, contraception, scientific child rearing, and more easily obtainable divorces, gained currency • the impersonality of large cities loosened constraints on sexuality • homosexuals developed a distinct culture

5. The Younger Generation • the failure to achieve the idealistic goals of America’s entry into World War I created a feeling of alienation among young adults • however, popular notions of the Jazz Age only superficially reflected reality • young people behaved in unconventional ways because they were adjusting to more rapid changes than previous generations • trends barely perceptible during the Progressive Era reached avalanche proportions

6. patterns of courtship changed; respectable women smoked cigarettes in public; women cast off corsets, wore lipstick, shortened their hair, and shortened their skirts • parents worried about the breakdown of all moral standards, but many facets of the youth rebellion reflected a conformity to peer pressure • young people’s new ways of relating to each other were not mere fads and were not confined to people under thirty

7. The “New” Woman • Margaret Sanger, a political radical concerned about poor women who lacked knowledge of contraception, led the battle for birth control • Sanger encountered legal, religious, and societal barriers but helped win wide acceptance for birth control • other gender-based restrictions slowly broke down • many states modified divorce laws to protect women’s rights

8. more women attended college and worked, but women earned less than men and were excluded from many management positions • radical feminists realized that voting did not guarantee equality; they founded the Women’s Party and campaigned for an equal rights amendment • less radical women founded the League of Women Voters and campaigned for broad social reforms

9. Popular Culture: Movies and Radio • popular culture changed dramatically as moving pictures grew in sophistication and appeal • the introduction of sound in 1927 brought a new level of technological maturity • filmmakers like D. W. Griffith created an entirely new art. Radio exerted an even greater impact • radio soon brought a wide variety of public events into American homes

10. by using radio to spread its messages, the advertising industry subsidized the nascent medium • because advertisers sought mass markets, however, they preferred uncontroversial, intellectually light programs

11. The Golden Age of Sports • prosperity, increased leisure time, radio, and advertising dollars all promoted the extraordinary popularity of sports in the 1920s • sports heroes such as Harold “Red” Grange, Jack Dempsey, Bill Tilden, and Babe Ruth enthralled the American public • new stadiums filled with capacity crowds; radio brought the action into living rooms of millions • football became the dominant college sport, and tens of thousands of Americans took up participatory sports such as tennis, golf, and water sports

12. Urban-Rural Conflicts: Fundamentalism • rural America viewed cities as hotbeds of decadence, sin, and overt materialism • religious fundamentalism emerged as a reaction of rural conservatives toward the perceived excesses of urban culture • the Scopes “Monkey Trial” typified the conflict between fundamentalism and modernism • John T. Scopes, a biology teacher, in cooperation with the American Civil Liberties Union, defied a Tennessee law banning the teaching of evolution in public schools

13. Clarence Darrow represented Scopes, while William Jennings Bryan represented the state (and, in a larger sense, rural, fundamentalist America) • although Scopes was convicted, the trial exposed the ignorance and danger of the fundamentalist position

14. Urban-Rural Conflicts: Prohibition • ratification of 18th Amendment (1919), which prohibited the manufacture, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages, signaled a great victory for the forces of rural conservatism • alcohol abuse declined during the “noble experiment”; however, the illegal trade in “booze” spawned corruption • by the end of the decade, it was readily apparent that prohibition had failed, but powerful moral and political forces prevented modification or repeal

15. The Ku Klux Klan • the new Ku Klux Klan, founded in 1915 by William J. Simmons, achieved a peak membership of five million in 1923 • its targets included immigrants, Jews, and Catholics, as well as blacks • using appeals to patriotism, nativism, morality, and traditional Americanism, the Klan found supporters primarily in middle-sized cities, small towns, and villages in the middle western and western states

16. factionalism and misconduct by leaders weakened the Klan • by the late twenties, it was in decline; in 1930, it had only nine thousand members

17. Sacco and Vanzetti • in 1921, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were convicted of murdering a paymaster and a guard during a holdup in Massachusetts • two men were Italian immigrants and anarchists • irrespective of their guilt or innocence, their trial was a travesty of justice • after years of appeals, two men were executed • the case contributed to the disillusion and alienation of many intellectuals

18. Literary Trends • the horrors of World War I combined with the antics of fundamentalists and red baiters led intellectuals to abandon the hopeful experimentation of the prewar period • intellectuals became critics of society • out of this alienation came a major literary flowering • F. Scott Fitzgerald symbolized this “lost generation” and captured its spirit in his novels, This Side of Paradise and The Great Gatsby

19. some writers and artists became expatriates • the most talented of this group, Ernest Hemingway, became the symbol of the expatriate American intellectual • The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms revealed a sense of outrage at life’s meaninglessness • even more than Hemingway’s ideas, his sparse literary style accounts for his towering reputation • Edith Wharton wrote about New York’s nineteenth century elite in a traditional style reminiscent of Henry James

20. H. L. Mencken reflected the distaste of intellectuals for the climate of the times • most popular writer of 1920s, Sinclair Lewis, portrayed the smug ignorance and bigotry of the American small town in Main Street • in Babbitt, Arrowsmith, and Elmer Gantry, Lewis presented scathing indictments of business, the medical profession, and religion • along with new literary styles, the twenties witnessed innovations in the distribution of literature, most notably founding of the Book-of-the-Month Club

21. The “New Negro” • southern blacks continued to migrate to North • while blacks in northern cities had always tended to live together, the tendency toward concentration continued and produced ghettos • disappointment of their wartime expectations led to a new militancy among blacks • W. E. B. Du Bois vacillated between integration and black nationalism

22. Marcus Garvey had no such ambivalence; his Universal Negro Improvement Association stressed black pride and a return to Africa • black leaders like Du Bois considered Garvey a charlatan • Garvey was convicted of defrauding thousands of his supporters when his steamship line went bankrupt • the northern ghettos produced some compensating advantages

23. concentrations of black populations enabled them to elect representatives to state legislatures and to Congress • Harlem became a cultural center for writers, musicians, and artists • within the ghetto existed a world with economic, political, and social opportunities for black men and women that did not exist in the South

24. Economic Expansion • despite the turmoil of the period and the dissatisfaction of intellectuals, the 1920s was an exceptionally prosperous era in America • business boomed, real wages rose, and unemployment declined • perhaps as much as 40 percent of the world’s wealth lay in American hands

25. government policy, pent-up demand from the war, and the continuing mechanization and rationalization of industry fueled economic growth • assembly lines and time and motion engineering helped increase productivity and profits

26. The Age of the Consumer • increases in productivity and prosperity brought a new era of consumerism • producers tailored their goods to meet consumer demand, and the advertising industry ensured that the demand existed • consumer durables led the economic surge • the automotive industry in particular exerted a powerful multiplier force on the economy • by 1929, Americans drove some 29 million privately owned automobiles

27. the car changed family life and recreational patterns • it made a mobile people more mobile and became a symbol of American freedom, prosperity, and individualism

28. Henry Ford • Henry Ford, the man most responsible for the growth of the automotive industry, was not a great inventor • his genius lay in the areas of production, personnel, and business management techniques • cost-efficient assembly lines allowed mass production of inexpensive cars

29. Ford realized that high wages not only ensured retention of his trained work force but also stimulated consumer spending • the Ford Motor Company’s “Model T,” a low-cost, well-constructed auto, dominated the market for many years • Ford’s unwillingness to cater to consumer demand, however, enabled other manufacturers to cut into Ford's share of the market

30. The Airplane • internal combustion gasoline engines made motorized flight possible • World War I speeded the advance of airplane technology, and most planes built in the 1920s were intended for military use • in the postwar years, wing walkers, parachutists, and other “barnstormers” expanded the public’s fascination with the airplane

31. commercial air service developed slowly; the first regularly scheduled passenger and mail service began in 1927 • Charles A. “Lucky Lindy” Lindbergh captured the world's imagination with his nonstop New York to Paris flight in May 1927