Chapter 23

The 1920’s: Coping With Change

1920-1929

Introduction

• Why was the economy so prosperous in the 1920’s?

• What were the dominant political values of the 1920’s?

• What was the new popular culture of the decade and which Americans did it barely touch?

• What developments in the period contributed to both the social tensions and artistic flowering?

Booming Business, Ailing Agriculture

• Economy grew rapidly and prospered largely due to electrical appliance industry (refrigerators, washing machines, vacuum cleaners) and automobile industry

• Related industries also prospered• American businesses invested abroad• High Protective Tariffs suppressed

international trade• Farmers suffered from surpluses and low

prices

New Modes of Producing, Managing and Selling

• Assembly line and other innovations increases production 40%

• Chain Stores• Installment Buying• Modern National Advertising• Business leaders were the new American

Hero

Women in the New Economic Era

• 24% of the workforce were women• Secretaries, typists, filing clerks• Teaching and Nursing

Struggling Labor Unions

• Union membership fell from 5 million to 3.4 million

• Intimidation, Open Shop, Scab labor• Benefits

Stand Pat Politics in the Decade of Change

• 1920 Warren G. Harding defeated James M. Cox

• Charles Forbes- stole money from the Veterans bureau

• Attorney General Harry Daugherty sold immunity from prosecution

• Secretary of Interior Albert Fall- Tea pot Dome Scandal

Republican Policy Making in the Pro-business era

• Calvin Coolidge replaces Harding upon his death

• High Protective Tariffs• Andrew Mellon convinces Congress to lower

taxes • William Howard Taft and the Supreme Court rule

Federal Child labor Law is unconstitutional• Coolidge vetoes bill to buy surplus farm

commodities

Independent Internationalism

• US protected American interests but refused to join the League of Nations

• Charles E. Hughes called for an arms reduction treaty at the Washington Naval Conference in 1921

Progressive Stirrings, Democratic Party Divisions

• Election of 1924– Democrats nominate John W. Davis– Progressives nominate Robert LaFollette– Republicans nominate Calvin Coolidge who

wins easily

Women and politics in the 1920’s: A Dream Deferred

• 19th Amendment did not lead to a great influence of women in politics

• Women's Rights groups splintered over goals of the movement

Cities, Cars, Consumer Goods

• Traffic jams, parking problems, accidental deaths, reduced parental supervision of young adults

• New consumer goods available to city dwellers

• New electrical appliances• Henry Ford and the $5 Day

Soaring Energy Consumption and a Threatened Environment

• Coal• Oil• Air Pollution

Mass-Produced Entertainment

• Reader’s Digest• Radio Programs• Silent to Talkies/ Movies

Celebrity Culture

• Babe Ruth• Ty Cobb• Jack Dempsey• Charles Lindbergh

The Jazz Age and the post War Crisis of Values

• Sigmund Freud• Women/Flappers• Jazz

Alienated Writers

• Lost Generation– Sinclair Lewis– Earnest Hemingway– F. Scott Fitzgerald

• Harlem Renaissance– Langston Hughes– Zora Neal Hurston– Countee Cullen

Architects, Painters, Musicians Celebrate Modern America

• Frank Lloyd Wright• Artists

– Thomas Hart Benton– Edward Hopper– Georgia O’Keeffe

• Musicians– George Gershwin– Bessie Smith– Louis Armstrong– Duke Ellington

Advances in Science and Medicine

• Arthur Compton– X-Rays

• Whooping Cough, Measles, Influenza• Life Expectancy

Immigration Restriction

• Established quotas for each nationality• Laws excluded Chinese and Japanese

entirely• Eastern and Southern Europeans received

small quotas• National Origins Quota remained US law

until 1965

Needed Workers/Unwelcome Aliens: Hispanic Newcomers

• The 1920's National Origins Act did not limit immigration from Western Hemisphere countries

• 1930's about 2 million Mexicans arrived in the US

• Nativism

Nativism, Anti-Radicalism and the Sacco and Vanzetti Case

• Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti- Italian immigrants were convicted of robbery and murder

• Evidence was circumstantial• Ethnic Origin and Political Radicalism

Fundamentalism and the Scopes Trial

• Several states passed laws prohibiting the teaching of any theory that contradicted creationism

• John T. Scopes- Substitute Teacher from Dayton Tennessee, fired and fined for teaching evolution

• ACLU hired Clarence Darrow to represent Scopes

• William Jennings Bryan assisted the prosecution• Billy Sunday and Aimee Semple Mcherson

The KKK and Garvey Movement

• KKK- 5 million members• Marcus Garvey- UNIA (United Negro

Improvement Association)– Black pride– Economic solidarity– Return to Africa Movement– 80,000 Members

Prohibition: Cultures in Conflict• 1928 Election Issue

– Organized Crime– Democrat Alfred E. Smith– Republican Herbert Hoover

• Supporters– Native born fundamentalists Protestants– Lived mainly in rural areas

• Opponents– Liberals– Intellectuals– Rebellious Youths– Immigrants

Herbert Hoover’s Social Thought

• Encouraged voluntary cooperation among corporate leaders– raise wages– plan production– marketing – standardized products

• Self Regulation would ensure economic growth and a better life for all