Dwight D. Eisenhower

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Dwight D. Eisenhower

• Domestic Policy and Civil Rights of the 1950s

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I. Election of 1952 (review)
A. Democratic candidate Adlai
Stevenson B. Republican candidate Dwight D.
Eisenhower (VP) Richard M. Nixon C. Major
issues Korea, Communism, Corruption
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I. Ike and Modern Republicanism

1. Conservative when it comes to money liberal
   when it comes to human beings
2. Ike cut billions of dollars from the federal
   budget by reducing the number of govt jobs and
   by leasing govt land
3. Expanded Social Security and unemployment
   benefits increased educational spending and
   minimum wage.

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II. The Affluent Society

1. The 1950s was a time of prosperity for many
   Americans about 60 were earning a middle-class
   income
2. Consumerism was highly promoted keeping up
   with the Joneses
3. Family life, accompanying the post-war Baby
   Boom, was promoted as well

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III. Election of 1956 - Candidates

• A. Democratic
• Adlai Stevenson
• B. Republican
• Dwight D. Eisenhower
• (Richard Nixon VP)

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• C. Ike won just under 60 of the popular vote
  electoral vote was 457 to 73 in favor of Ike!
• D. Ike failed to win either house of Congress for
  his party country remained heavily Democratic
  but everyone loved Ike.

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Electoral Map of 1956
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IV. Major Legislation under Ike

• A. Federal Highway Act of 1956 (May) authorized
  the construction of a network of superhighways
  primary purpose was defense
• B. Civil Rights Act of 1957
• 1. first civil rights bill passed in
• U.S. since Reconstruction!!!

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• 2. Organized to investigate the abuses of civil
  rights  the rights of personal liberty
  guaranteed to United States citizens by the 13th
  and 14th amendments to the Constitution and by
  acts of Congress
• 3. Aimed to ensure that all African Americans
  could exercise their right to vote

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Beginning of the Civil Rights Movement (Ikes 1st
2nd Terms)
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I. Jim Crow in the South

• A. 1950 15 million African-Americans in the U.S.
  2/3 still lived in the South
• B. Only about 20 of Southern blacks were
  registered to vote

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• C. Segregation legally upheld by 1896 Supreme
  Court Case Plessy v. Ferguson - Remember, this
  established separate but equal
• D. Du jure vs. De facto segregation du jure
  segregation enforced by LAW
• De facto segregation that exists in fact

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II. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas

• A. Earl Warren became the Chief Justice of the
  Supreme Court in 1953
• B. May, 1954 - most important decision of the
  Warren Court
• C. In a unanimous decision, Brown v. Board
  overturned the Plessy v. Ferguson case by stating
  that segregation in public schools was
  inherently unequal.

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Chief Justice Earl Warren
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• D. Brown decision declared that desegregation
  must go ahead with all deliberate speed
• E. Eisenhower was not a major force in
  desegregation he said this case had upset the
  customs and convictions of at least two
  generations of Americans.

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III. Death of Emmett Till

• A. August 1955 14-year-old Chicago boy visited
  relatives near Money, MS
• B. Supposedly whistled and called the wife of a
  local (white) store owner Baby.
• C. Till was taken a few nights later by the store
  owner and his brother-in-law.

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• D. Body of Till was found three days later in the
  Tallahatchie River corpse unrecognizable
• E. Mother of Till insisted on an open casket
  funeral so the entire world could see what
  happened
• F. Trial failed to convict the men accused of the
  crime even with eye witnesses
• G. Huge impact on ALL African-Americans
  North/South

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From PBSs timeline of the murder September 21
Moses Wright, Emmett Till's great uncle, does the
unthinkable, accusing 2 white men in open court.
While on the witness stand, he stands up, points
his finger at Milam and Bryant, and accuses them
of coming to his house and kidnapping
Emmett. September 23 Milam and Bryant are
acquitted of murdering Emmett Till after the jury
deliberates only 67 minutes. One juror tells a
reporter that they wouldn't have taken so long if
they hadn't stopped to drink pop. Roy Bryant and
J. W. Milam stand before photographers, light up
cigars and kiss their wives in celebration of the
not guilty verdict. Moses Wright and another poor
black Mississippian who testified, Willie Reed,
leave Mississippi and are smuggled to Chicago.
Once there, Reed collapses and suffers a nervous
breakdown. http//www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/till/ti
meline/timeline2.html
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• 1956
• January 24 Look magazine publishes an article
  written by Alabama journalist William Bradford
  Huie, entitled The Shocking Story of Approved
  Killing in Mississippi. Huie offered Roy Bryant
  and J. W. Milam 4,000 to tell how they killed
  Emmett Till. Milam speaks for the record.

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Bob Dylan The Death of Emmett Till
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IV. Montgomery, AL Bus Boycott

• A. Beginning December 1955
• B. Rosa Parks, a college-educated black
  seamstress, boarded a bus, refused to give up her
  seat on the bus to a white.
• C. She was arrested in violation of the citys
  Jim Crow statues

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• D. This action sparked a year-long bus boycott of
  the citys buses.
• E. Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. became the
  noted Civil Rights leader by organizing the bus
  boycott.
• F. King followed the principles of Indias
  Mahatma Gandhi nonviolent resistance
• G. The boycott ended in Nov of 56 when the
  Supreme Court declared ALs bus segregation
  illegal.

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V. Little Rock Crisis

• A. South refused to abide by the Brown Decision
• B. Several private schools were created

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• C. September 1957 Orval Faubus, governor of
  Arkansas, mobilized the Arkansas National Guard
  to prevent 9 black students from enrolling in
  Little Rocks Central HS

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• Eisenhower was forced to send troops to escort
  the students to class.
• E. Little Rock
• High School
• closed in
• 1958 to avoid
• integration.

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VI. Southern Christian Leadership Conference
(SCLC)

• A. Organized in 1957 by Martin Luther
  King, Jr.
• B. Churches were the largest and best-organized
  black institutions allowed to be successful in
  the segregated society.
• C. This movement thus aimed to mobilize
  influential black churches on behalf of civil
  rights.

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Sit-In Movement

• February 1, 1960 four African-American college
  students sat down at the lunch counter inside the
  Woolworth's department store in Greensboro, NC.
   The men ordered coffee, but following store
  policy, the lunch counter staff refused to serve
  them at the "whites only" counter the store's
  manager asked them to leave.  

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• The men stayed until closing, and they came back
  the next day... with friends (over 20 people).
   The continued to come until they received
  service.
• The sit-in movement continued spreading, both at
  this store and around the state.
• - It took six months to accomplish its goal in
  July of 1960, Woolworth's desegregated.