Postwar America, 1946 1952

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CHAPTER 27

• Postwar America, 1946 - 1952

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Reconversion

• Americans face two major questions at end of
  WWII
• What will be relationship with Soviet Union?
• Will the economy thrive or flounder?
• Servicemens Readjustment Act (G.I. Bill)
• Provided new opportunities for veterans to
  purchase homes and attend college
• Economy surges forward as consumer spending
  begins in earnest
• Militancy of labor led to strikes

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Affluence and Anxiety

• Baby booming
• Families place greater emphasis on children
• Listening to experts and agonizing over child
  rearing
• Woman displaced in workforce by returning vets
• Post-war women became nations primary consumers
• Many women still worked outside home, in
  feminine jobs
• Suburbia after the war
• Levittown
• Reinforced traditional family roles

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The Soviet Threat

• Soviet containment
• Winston Churchill and the Iron Curtain
• George Kennan
• President unveils Truman Doctrine
• Civil war in Greece
• Implements help from Europe
• Marshall Plan
• 27 billion spent to help Europe recover
• National Security Act of 1947
• Created National Security Council, Department of
  Defense, and the Central Intelligence Agency

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Liberalism in Retreat

• House Un-American Activities Committee
• Searched for communists in America
• Alger Hiss and Whittaker Chambers
• Pumpkin Papers
• Taft-Hartley Act curbs power of unions and
  fosters racial discrimination
• Jackie Robinson breaks baseballs color line
• Truman surprises experts with wins in 1948
• Dixiecratics
• Strom Thurmond

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Racial Segregation, 1949
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Election of 1948
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Trouble in Asia

• Communism prevails in China in 1949
• Chiang Kai-Shek
• Mao Tse-tung
• North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
• North Korea invades South Korea in 1950
• United States and United Nations send forces
• Douglas MacArthur
• Inchon
• Truman relieves MacArthur, April 1951

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Korean War
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McCarthyism and the Election of 1952

• Red Scare brings fear and McCarthyism to U.S.
• Joseph McCarthy
• Dwight Eisenhower runs for presidency in 1952
• Adlai Stevenson
• Richard Nixon is named running mate for
  Eisenhower
• Democratic attacks against Nixon backfired
• Checkers
• Ike elected president
• Republicans gain slim control of Congress

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Presidential Election, 1952
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Discussion Questions

• Examine the rise of consumerism in the U.S. after
  the war. What role did the G.I. Bill play in
  post-war economy?
• What factors caused the U.S. and the Soviets go
  from allies to enemies?
• What were the causes of the Korean War? What was
  Americas reasons for becoming involved?
• What part did Alger Hiss and Joe McCarthy play in
  the Red Scare of the 1950s?