1. Post-war Issues and Return to Normalcy
Unit 5 Section 9
Post-war Issues and Return to Normalcy

2. Post-War Issues
Following the Progressive Era and The Great War – many Americans exhausted with change and disorder
Some crave return to simpler times
Wave of nativism and isolationism sweeps the country
Events of the War lead to new issues that must be addressed:
Fear of Communism
Immigration Questions
Labor Unrest

3. Fear of Communism Communism is seen as a growing threat to America
Communism – Political / economic system in which the government controls all means of production. Private property is eliminated.
Red Scare – Panic over communism that swept America following the Russian Revolution
clip

4. Fear of Communism Communist Party forms in US
Joined by thousands of radical workers
Protested US involvement in WW1
Palmer Raids- FBI raids on suspected communists, violated civil liberties
Sacco and Vanzetti – Two Italian anarchists immigrants, executed for murder on flimsy evidence (later evidence shows they were probably guilty)

5. Immigration Questions
Along with fear of Communism, protests over immigration
US wants to remain isolated; suspicious of foreign influence
Re-emergence of KKK as anti-immigrant
Quota System limits immigrants from certain countries
History of Immigration to the US

6. Labor Unrest During war, government had ended labor strikes
1919, 3,000 strikes nationwide as cost of living rises, but not wages
Communist fears and accusations:
Boston Police Strike
US Steel Strike
Coal Miners Strike
Unions lose some power as they are associated by public with Communism
Open shop system

7. Gastonia, 1929
Workers at Loray Mills facing shrinking wages, longer hours
Textile Union with communist backing steps in; calls for strike
Strike turns violent as National Guard is called in
Gastonia’s Chief of Police is shot in struggle, strikers murdered in the aftermath
Nationwide attention to trial
“Crack in armor” of historically anti-union South

8. Click for a NY Times article on the mill’s renovation in 2013.

9. Harding Presidency Warren Harding, OH Republican elected in 1920
Campaign slogan, “A return to normalcy”
Plans for Peace:
Washington Naval Conference, Proposes disarmament, followed by
Kellogg Briand Pact, Renounces war as national policy…signed by 64 nations. Great in theory

10. Isolationism Through Tariff
1922, Harding Administration adopts Fordney-McCumber Tariff
Highest ever at 60% on imported goods
Makes repayment of WW1 to Britain and France difficult

11. Scandals Plague Harding
Harding’s cabinet, “The Ohio Gang” proves corrupt
Harding did not understand many issues – friends in Cabinet took advantage
Teapot Dome Scandal– Sec. of Interior leases oil rich public lands to oil companies – pockets profits.
First cabinet member convicted of a felony in office
Harding dies in August, ’23, succeeded by Calvin Coolidge

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13. From http://www.freedomschool.com