Behavioral Objectives (Test Items)

Here are the specific tasks you will be called upon to perform successfully on the Unit IV Exam. The information required for mastery of the reading objectives is contained in Chapters 29-31 of America: Past and Present. The information required for the mastery of the lecture objectives is contained in the classroom lectures for this unit - "When All The Experts Got It Wrong," "The American Civil Rights Revolution," and "Vietnam: Entrapment".

READING OBJECTIVES

Affluence and Anxiety

Determine why America bade farewell to the New Deal spirit and the effect this had on Trumanís domestic program known as the Fair Deal.

Define "modern republicanism" as developed during the Eisenhower presidency.

Contrast Dwight Eisenhower's perception of the presidency with that of his Democratic predecessors, FDR and HST.

Identify the civil rights proposals offered by President Truman, the legislative outcome of these measures, and the political reaction this ignited in the South.

Be familiar with each of the following actions in the struggle for civil rights: (a) Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954), (b) the crisis at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, (c) the 1957 Civil Rights Act, (d) the Montgomery Bus Boycott and non-violent resistance, (e) the "sit-ins" designed to challenge Jim Crow segregation, (f) the Highway Act of 1956.
 
 

The Turbulent Sixties

Compare and contrast John Kennedyís views of the Cold War with those of Eisenhower and Dulles.

Identify programs and policies that demonstrated the Kennedy administrationís "flexible response" in foreign affairs.

Describe actions in the field of containment taken by Kennedy with respect to both Berlin and Vietnam.

Summarize the main events and results of the Bay of Pigs landing and the Cuban missile crisis.

Evaluate the accomplishment of the New Frontier in the domestic arena being sure to identify obstacles to its successful enactment.

Be familiar with President Kennedyís efforts in the field of civil rights and how he dealt with an increasingly active campaign on behalf of equality by black leaders.

Be familiar with the actions of the Supreme Court in each of the following decisions: (a) Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), (b) Escobedo v. Illinois (1964), (c) Miranda v. Arizona (1966), (d) Baker v. Carr (1962).

Identify major legislative successes of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society program and explain Johnson's remarkable success in contrast to Kennedy's miniscule legislative record.

Be familiar with President Johnsonís landslide victory over Senator Barry Goldwater in the 1964 election being sure to note the defection of five states in the South over the civil rights issue.

Be familiar with President Johnson's intervention in the Dominican Republic.

Identify and discuss President Johnson's various motivations for the "Americanization" of the war in Vietnam and how the escalation of the conflict undermined the Johnson presidency.

Be familiar with the protest movements of the 1960s - American youth, blacks, chicanos, women - as well as their criticisms of American society.

Identify the candidates and issues in the 1968 presidential race and explain the outcome.
 
 

To A New Conservatism, 1969-1988

Be familiar with how President Nixon used his dealings with the Supreme Court to solidify his and the Republican party's standing in the South.

Describe in detail the Nixon-Kissinger attitude toward Soviet-American relations being sure to identify such particulars as detente, the Sino-Soviet split, the role of the United States, etc.

Describe how the American recognition of Red China was an attempt at balance-of-power diplomacy aimed at the Soviet Union.

Discuss President Nixon's deescalation of the war in Vietnam from 1969 through 1973.

Identify the various consequences of the Cambodian incursion.

Identify the particulars of the diplomatic agreement ending the American war in Vietnam.

Evaluate and discuss the following questions dealing with the Watergate scandal and President Nixon's resignation of the presidency. What unethical/illegal activities were disclosed? What factors led to impeachment proceedings? Did the President's actions warrant impeachment? Was he hounded unjustly into retirement by enemies and the press?

Identify and discuss the historical implications of the Watergate Scandal and Nixon's resignation from the presidency.
 
 

LECTURE OBJECTIVES
 
 

"When All The Experts Got It Wrong"

Identify and describe the various strains within the "Roosevelt Coalition" of the modern Democratic party as the election of 1948 approached.

Be familiar with the various civil rights proposals made by President Harry S. Truman and how he sought to finesse the issue during the 1948 election year.

Evaluate the role that civil rights played in the Democratic convention and the subsequent campaign being sure to cover each of the following: (a) Hubert Humphrey's speech on the civil rights plank of the Democratic party platform and how various elements of the party responded, (b) President Truman's dual handling of the issue - one way in the South, a different way elsewhere, (c) the States Rights/Dixiecrat insurgency led by South Carolina governor Strom Thurmond and others, (d) the manner in which mainstream Democratic candidates in Texas reacted to Truman's candidacy & his call for civil rights legislation.

Be familiar with the various candidates for the presidency and the nature of their 1948 campaigns.

Evaluate why almost all political prognosticators predicted a Thomas E. Dewey victory in the presidential contest.

Identify and discuss the reasons for President Truman's "upset" victory including: (a) the "reverse coattails" phenomenon, (b) the enduring viability of the "Roosevelt Coalition" despite numerous strains, (c) Truman's attacks on the "Do Nothing Congress" and his energetic "whistle stop" campaign, (d) Republican overconfidence and Thomas E. Dewey's less-than-aggressive campaign, (e) the minimal impact in the Electoral College of the Dixiecrat and Progressive party rebellions.
 
 

"The American Civil Rights Revolution"

Be familiar with the effect of the New Deal and World War II on the coming of the civil rights revolution in the thirty years following the war.

Identify the branch of the federal government to which leaders of the civil rights movement turned increasingly in the 1940s and 1950s and why.

Identify and recognize the historical significance of each of the following: (a) Smith v. Allwright, (b) Sweatt v. Painter, (c) Brown v. Topeka Board of Education.

Identify the methods used by white segregationists to resist desegregation of public school systems.

Evaluate President Eisenhower's response during the desegregation crisis at Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957.

Identify and recognize the historical significance of each of the following: (a) the Civil Rights Act of 1957, (b) the Civil Rights Act of 1964, (c) the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Identify factors responsible for the end of this particular civil rights revolution.
 
 

"Vietnam: Entrapment"

Identify the major goals as well as the primary motivation of President Nixon's "Vietnamization" program.

Describe the Cambodian Incursion as well as its various consequences.

Identify the various "unsettling and disquietening" aspects of the Vietnam War for the American people.

Identify the particulars of the Paris Peace Accords of 1973 and describe the subsequent fall of South Vietnam.