Intolerance

• Intolerant


  Unwillingness to accept views, beliefs, or behaviour that differ from one's own
• Supremacists


  • Members of the Ku Klux Klan and others, who believed white Anglo-Saxon Protestants (WASPS) were superior to other groups in the USA, including black Americans, Native Americans, white Catholics and Jews
• Bolshevik Revolution


  • In October 1917, communists, also known as Bolsheviks, took over the government of Russia. The former Ruler, the Tsar, have been deposed in an earlier revolution in February 1917. The Bolsheviks aimed to abolish all private property and took all private business under government control. Money invested in Russian companies by foreign investors was confiscated by the Bolshevik government. These actions caused deep concern within the USA.
• Confederate States


  • Between 1861 and 1865, 11 states in the south-east of the USA declared their independence from the USA in order to preserve the practice of enslaving black Americans. These states were Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, Texas, Louisiana and Florida. At the end of the Civil War, slavery was abolished in the USA. Following their defeat in the US Civil War, former Confederate states began introducing 'Jim Crow' laws, which deprived black Americans of the right to vote and forced them to live lives separate from whites through legal segregation. This situation lasted until the 1960s. As the Republican Party had freed the slaves, these states traditionally voted for the Democratic Party – although this began to shift over time.
• Bootlegging


  The illegal transportation and sale of intoxicating liquor
• The 1920s could be considered as a decade of intolerance due to a number of themes: Communism and the 'Red Scare', Immigration, The KKK, Prohibition, Women
• Intolerance towards communism - The Red Scare

  1. November 1917 – Bolshevik Revolution – created world's first communist state

  2. Communist ideas = direct threat to the US political/economic system

  3. Immigrants from central/eastern Europe came to the USA as feared (also enforced for German/Austro-Hungarian citizens)

  4. 1919 – post-war inflation caused strikes – 4m involved

  5. Extreme left-wing (communism was the extreme left wing) trade unions were seen as causing most of this unrest
• The Red Scare


  1. An early version of the FBI was set up to investigate the scale of communist activity in the USA

  2. By 1920 the federal government was acting – the 'Palmer raids' were launched against left-wing newspapers and activists. 6,000 were arrested

  3. By the middle of the 1920s, the 'Red Scare' had died down
• Intolerance towards immigrants


  Immigrants from central/eastern Europe came to the USA as feared (also enforced for German/Austro-Hungarian citizens)
• Case of Sacco & Vanzetti


  • May 1920 – 2 Italian immigrants with left-wing views arrested and put on trial for murder
  • Sacco and Vanzetti case divided the USA
  • Evidence of their involvement was circumstantial e.g. they had anarchist ideas
  • 1920-27 S&V faced trial and then appeal
  • 1927 – executed for murder
• Government response


  1. Opposition to immigrants (especially non-English speakers) had grown since WW1, so the government began passing legislation to limit the arrival of new immigrants to America

  2. 1917 – Immigration Act – Denied entry to the USA to those who could not read or write, and barred immigration from many Asian countries. Passed by a veto (overruling the President) by both houses of the US government

  3. 1921 – Emergency Immigration Act – limited immigration to 3% of the total of the national group already in the USA (favoured British, and Western European immigrants)

  4. 1924 –Johnson-Reed Immigration Act –changes made permanent. New quotas of 2% from a particular region placed. Increased bias towards British/Western European further. Hispanics in California exempt
• The Ku Klux Klan (KKK) was possibly the clearest sign of intolerance
• Ku Klux Klan (KKK)

  • Established immediately after the Civil War (1861-65) in former Confederate states to protect whites and attack/intimidate black Americans
  • By the 1870s the KKK were in decline
  • 1915 – revived by William Simmons (influenced by new literature and a feature film – The Birth of a Nation) – portrayed the old KKK as heroes of the white race
• Popularity of the KKK

  1. KKK seen as a way to defend the small town

  2. Heavy involvement of White Anglo-Saxon Protestants (WASPS)

  3. 1915 onwards – also against Catholics and Jews

  4. Edgar Young and Elizabeth Tyler used public relations to spur membership

  5. $10 could get you a white robe and a hood

  6. 1924 – national membership of 4m

  7. Many state governments – e.g. Colorado were sympathetic to the KKK and did not prosecute against them
• Decline of the KKK


  1. However their rapid rise was also followed by a rapid decline

  2. 1925 – the KKK Indiana leader, 'Grand Dragon' – David Curtis Stephenson convicted of rape and murder of a 28y/o woman

  3. Badly damaged reputation

  4. 1929 – KKK membership down to 200,000
• Prohibition


  1920-33 – Sale, manufacturing and consumption of intoxicating liquor (alcohol) was banned across all of the US
• Why did prohibition happen?

  1. Organisations such as Anti-Saloon League campaigned hardly for prohibition – alcohol ruins lives (men wasted wages, families starving, caused violence, lead to gambling and prostitution)

  2. Huge support from WASPS – saw drinking as a feature of immigrant life

  3. Many breweries were German = prohibition was patriotic
• Why didn't prohibition work?

  1. Issue split the Democratic Party – 'Dry' Democrats from South/West opposed by 'Wet' Democrats from cities

  2. However – law was largely ignored

  3. President Harding (1921-23) served alcoholic drinks at White House functions

  4. 1000s of illegal drinking place – 'speakeasies' set up

  5. Many made alcohol illegally - moonshine
• Why did national prohibition fail?

  1. Drinking was part of peoples culture – e.g. Irish Americans

  2. US had 6,500 miles of land borders with Canada and Mexico – neither of which had banned alcohol = huge numbers of illegal imports

  3. Federal government had 3,000 Prohibition agents, paid on average $2,500 a year – low salary = susceptible to bribery

  4. Number of agents + borders = too much to patrol effectively
• Prohibition raised lots of issues about US society. It arguably created more problems than it solved.
• Intolerance towards the law and the creation of organised crime

  1. Major issue of intolerance was against the law

  2. This was carried out by organised crime groups, that became hugely rich selling alcohol illegally during prohibition

  3. Previously – dominated by gambling and prostitution

  4. Saw an opportunity to make money out of alcohol sales

  5. Al Capone
• Organised Crime


  1. Gangs became heavily involved in politics – bribed police, judges, politicians to ensure they maintained profits

  2. Led to huge rivalries between gangs – centre of bootleg activity was Chicago

  3. 14th Feb 1929 – Italian-American gang, led by Al Capone, wiped out leaders of his main rivals, Jewish/Irish-American gang led by Bugs Moran (following the murder of their previous leader Dion O'Banion) in the St Valentine's Day Massacre
• Organised Crime


  1. Prohibition abolished in 1933

  2. But organised crime remained a feature of US life – vying for control of politicians, newspapers, judges and police

  3. Those who hoped prohibition would improve US society, had actually had the opposite effect

  4. President Hoover (1929-33) set up the Wickersham Commission to investigate national prohibition. Reported in 1931 that although prohibition should continue, it was impossible to enforce.
• Intolerance from women


  • 1920 – women received the right to vote in federal elections
  • 1920s – huge social change
  • Lasting image of the 'flapper' – young, independent women who felt like women's place was no longer in the home
  • Economic boom = opportunities for employment – e.g. receptionists = causes migration to towns/cities
  • Changes in fashion – use of cosmetics, short skirts/hair
• However – men still dominated politics (only 2 female governors), flappers were a thing of cities, not the standard, men still out earned women. Therefore US society remained largely intolerant to the changing status of women