Thursday, January 30, 2014 A Clash of Values -A Resurgence of Nativism -Changing Roles for Women -Fundamentalism and Prohibition

Resurgence of Nativism Nativism While the economy prospered in the 1920s, racial fears and ethnic intolerance grew. The aftermath of World War I saw prejudice toward Germans and Communists. Crime and other social problems were often blamed on immigrants. This led many Americans to support nativism—the belief that immigrants threatened the American way of life and that the United States must take steps to keep its culture, society, and people safe from outsiders.

Resurgence of Nativism Sacco and Vanzetti The murder trial of Italian immigrants Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti increased anti- immigrant sentiment. The men, who were anarchists, were found guilty and executed despite flimsy evidence.

Resurgence of Nativism KKK The Ku Klux Klan, which had sought to terrorize African Americans in the South after the Civil War, expanded in the 1920s to target Catholics, Jews, immigrants, and other “un-American” groups. Its goal was to preserve the United States as a nation they believed belonged to white Protestants.

Changing Roles for Women Suffrage Passage of the Nineteenth Amendment led women to push for social change in other aspects of American life. For example, changing attitudes toward marriage emphasized the romance, pleasure, and friendship between partners.

Changing Roles for Women Social Mores The automobile allowed young people to socialize in public rather than at home. Shorter “bobbed” hair and movie-star glamour changed fashion. Women known as flappers smoked cigarettes, drank liquor, and wore more revealing clothing.

Changing Roles for Women Educated Professionals Increasing numbers of working-class married women worked to support their families. Single women entered the workforce to establish financial independence. Women’s earnings allowed them to become greater consumers. Women’s colleges encouraged their students to pursue careers and to challenge traditional ideas about women’s roles in society.

Fundamentalism Culture Clash Fundamentalist Americans viewed the consumer culture, relaxed ethics, and changing roles of women as evidence of moral decline. In their opinion, the Christian Bible was without error and was to be taken literally. They pointed to the biblical version of creation as proof that the theory of evolution was wrong.

Fundamentalism Scopes Trial Trial lawyer Clarence Darrow and former presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan matched wits in the highly publicized 1925 Scopes trial over the teaching of evolution. Although the teacher, John Scopes, was convicted and fined $100, the court ruling was overturned, and the Fundamentalist movement suffered a set back.

Prohibition Temperance Some Americans supported a ban on the sale and consumption of alcohol. Formed in the 1830s, the American Temperance Society spearheaded the Temperance Movement—as it was known—for religious and social reasons.

Prohibition Enforcement Failures Passed in 1920, the Eighteenth Amendment, or Volstead Act, proved very difficult to enforce. Under the Volstead Act, U.S. Treasury personnel had authority to enforce the new law, but many Americans ignored it. In cities they bought alcohol in "speakeasies"; in rural areas, they bought it from bootleggers.

Prohibition Organized Crime Organized crime flourished by smuggling and distributing liquor. Gangsters such as Al Capone paid off politicians and law enforcement officials to turn a blind eye to the illegal activity. The struggle by federal agents to enforce the law was a bloody one, claiming the lives of more than 70 agents. In 1933 the Twenty-first Amendment ended Prohibition.