America - opportunity and inequality

• By 1925 over 500,000 people worked in the car industry in jobs such as making cars, but also road and maintenance
• 4 groups that didn't benefit from the boom are: farmers, old industries, African Americans and new immigrants
• Republicans :

  liked to preserve tradition

  liked to interfere as little as possible

  wanted to keep rich business people happy

  supported ' Laissez-faire' and 'isolationism'
• Democrats:

  more of an 'ordinary people' party

  believed government should intervene to help

  high taxes were needed to help the country

  helped those in need like poor and elderly
• Herbert hoover

  served 1929-33

  President during wall street crash where 25% of workforce lost jobs

  Believed america would recover due to rugged-individualism
• Franklin D Roosevelt (FDR)

  Served 1933-45

  Replaced Hoover

  First 100 days of his presidency was used to end the depression

  Created Alphabet agencies
• JFK's new frontier

  Cut taxes to give people more money to spend

  Minimum wage increased

  Increased funding for research into mental illness

  Increased government spending on the armed forces
• Johnson's great society

  Provided grant to fund artists and galleries

  safety standards were improved

  Medicare was created that helped to fund healthcare for elderly and low-income-families

  Increased minimum wage
• 1917 - immigration act - banned entrance to america of any immigrant over 16 who was unable to read a sentence of 40 words
• 1921 - immigration quota law - limited to only allowing 350,000 immigrant into America per year
• 1924 - national origins act - only 150,000 immigrants were allowed into America per year
• In 1917, the communist party in Russia overthrew the government, this created a fear this could also happen in America this became known as the 'red scare'
• 1919 - 36 parcel bombs were mailed to important American figures this worsened the red scare
• Palmer raids were a series of raids on suspected communists/ anarchists that could be seen as dangerous
• in 1920, Sacco and Vanzetti were jailed for the murders of 2 men during an armed robbery gone wrong
• Sacco and Vanzetti were Italian-American immigrants who were openly anarchists. They were accused of the murders of 2 factory workers however there is much debate over whether or not it was actually them who committed the murder
• from 1920-25, 5 million Americans joined the KKK
• 19th October 1929 - over 3 million shares were brought and sold so stock prices began to fall
• In FDR's first 100 days he accomplished 4 main tasks:

  Fireside chats

  Emergency Banking act

  End of prohibition

  Economy act
• Fireside chats - To restore the public's faith in the government, FDR did a series of radio addresses that went out to the nation, allowing them to have an idea on what was going on with the government at the time
• Emergency banking act - This act closed all banks in America for a minimum of 4 days, and then had t be checked by an inspector and be deemed stable enough to re-open
• End of Prohibition - or known as the beer act - saw the end of the 18th amendment and legalized the sale, consumption and production of alcohol in America
• Economy act - Cut everyone in the governments wages by 15% to help rebuild the economy - this also included FDR's own wages
• Roosevelt promoted the 3 R's - Relief, Recovery, Reform
• The second new deal consisted of 4 main things :

  The social security act

  The Wagner act

  The works progress administration

  The farm security administration
• The social security act - 1935 - meant Americans over 65 received a government pension. It also created benefits for the sick, disabled, the poor and the children
• The Wagner act - gave workers the right to join trade unions without the risk of being sacked. However some groups like farmers were not protected by this act
• The works progress administration create over 8.5 million jobs. These jobs range from things like construction to the arts
• The farm security administration settle families n government farms, also helped tenant farmers apply for loans or buy their land
• 5 groups that opposed FDR are - The rich, business men, the supreme court, republicans and radical politicians
• Brown vs board - 1945 - Linda brown , an African-American 3rd grader was denied admission to a white school even tho segregation was no longer in place
• The murder of Emmett Till - 1955. America was a 14 year old African American ho was brutally murdered for allegedly whistling at a white woman, who later admitted it wasn't true
• Montgomery bus boycott - 1955. Rosa Parks who is a member of the NAACP refused to give up her seat when a white man told her to. She was later arrested for this decision
• Little rock nine - 1957. After schools had been desegregated, 9 African American students went to attend little rock high school, a previously all white school. They faced abuse trying to go to the school. State troops were sent to stop students entering the school, but president Eisenhower sent his troops to allow them in
• The Greensboro sit-ins - 1960. White and black students were segregated at lunch times. In protest of this rule, they sat in each others areas and mixed.
• The freedom rides - 1961 - both white and African Americans boarded the bus in states that were desegregated, and rode into states where segregation was still enforced
• On the 1st November 1961, FDR issued a wide spread de-segregation across all american states
• MLK march on Birmingham -1963. An peaceful protest that was met ith a violent retaliation from police. This was shown to the public and was met with outrage
• MLK march on Washington - August 1963 - More than 250,000 people attended and MLK delivered his famous ' I have a dream speech'
• AAA- agricultural adjustment agencies - Farmers had mass amounts of crops and no one had the money to buy due to wall street crash The AAA payed farmers to burn their crops and to stop growing new crops to allow price to settle again