CH 25 RQ

What were the legacies of the Vietnam War?

The Vietnam War (or 'American War' to the Vietnamese) is such an enduring feature of the West's experience of the country that many visitors look out for legacies of the conflict. There is no shortage of physically deformed and crippled Vietnamese. Many men were badly injured during the war, but large numbers also received their injuries while serving in Cambodia (1979-1989). It is tempting to associate deformed children with the enduring effects of the pesticide Agent Orange (1.7 million tons had been used by 1973), although this has yet to be proven scientifically; American studies claim that there is no significant difference in congenital malformation. One thing is certain: Agent Orange is detectable today only in tiny isolated spots, often near former military bases.

What were the major events in the civil rights movement of the early 1960s?

The major events in the civil rights movement were sit in movements, freedom rides, Birmingham protests and violence, March on Washington, Civil Rights Act of 1964, Freedom Summer, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The "sit-in movement" was a tactic adopted by young civil rights activists, who organized the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in the beginning in 1960, of demanding service at lunch counters or public accommodations and refusing to leave if denied access. Freedom Rides was integrated groups who traveled by bus into the Deep South to test compliance with court orders banning segregation on interstate buses and trains and in terminal facilities and violent mobs assaulted them. The Birmingham protests and bombings caused the city to close public facilities rather than integrate them. MLK and others were arrested for demonstrating which when King composed his "Letter from Birmingham Jail" which was a plea for racial justice. Police dogs and fire hoses were used on young black marchers which was shown on TV and shocked millions of viewers. On August 28, 1963 over 250,000 black and white Americans converged on the nation's capital in an act of protest. The purpose of the March on Washington wasn't only to push forward the Civil Rights act in congress but also included a public-works program, reducing unemployment, increasing minimum wage and fight against a law barring discrimination in employment. This is where King gave his "I have a dream" speech. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited racial discrimination in public accommodations and employment. It also banned discrimination on the grounds of sex. Freedom Summer was when a coalition of civil rights groups launched a voter registration drive in Mississippi. Hundreds of white college students from the North traveled to the state to take part in Freedom Summer. And finally, The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was a law passed in the wake of MLK and it authorized federal protection of the right to vote and permitted federal enforcement of minority voting rights and in individual counties, mostly in the south. All of these events were significant and played a role in achieving rights for African Americans and fighting racial discrimination.

What were the most important social movements of the 1960s?

The most important social movements of the 1960s were the Civil Rights Movement, New Left, antiwar movement, counterculture, women's liberation, gay liberation, Latino movement, American Indian movement, and the environmental movement. The civil rights movement was a mass popular movement to secure for African Americans equal access to and opportunities for the basic privileges and rights of U.S. citizenship. The New Left was a radical youth protest movement of the 1960s, named by leader Tom Hayden to distinguish it from the Old (Marxist-Leninist) Left of the 1930s. It challenged mainstream America and instead of economic equality the New Left spoke of loneliness, isolation, and alienation, of powerlessness in the face of bureaucratic institutions and a hunger for authenticity that affluence couldn't provide. Their biggest inspiration was the black freedom movement and it grew with opposition to Vietnam. The Antiwar movement grew in opposition to the Vietnam War. With college students exempted from the draft, the burden of fighting fell on the working class and the poor. The war symbolized elite power and MLK spoke out against the war calling it an unconscionable use of violence and said it was draining resources from needs at home. By 1967, young men were burning their draft cards or fleeing to Canada to avoid fighting in what they considered an unjust war. In October of that year 100,000 antiwar protesters assembled at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. and marched across the Potomac River to the Pentagon. Counterculture was basically the hippie movement, it was the start of hippies challenging cultural norms. Millions of young people openly rejected the values and behavior of their elders; for the first time in American history, the flamboyant rejection of respectable norms in clothing, language, sexual behavior, and drug use became the basis of a mass movement. The movement represented freedom and individual choice and self-indulgence and self-destructive behavior were built into counterculture. Women's liberation began with young women who started to embrace an ideology of social equality and personal freedom. In 1967 women throughout the country were establishing "consciousness-raising" groups to discuss the sources of their discontent. They fought for education, high-paying jobs, and a political voice. The Feminine Mystique played a huge role in empowering women, NOW was formed to demand equal opportunity and attacked the "false image of women" spread by mass media, and Roe v. Wade was a big step to women taking back their right to their body and allowed abortion. Before Gay liberation many gay men and women were harassed and homosexual acts were illegal. One moment that marked gay liberation was the 1969 police raid on the Stonewall Inn which was a place where gays gathered. The gay men and women fought back for once and 5 days after the riot the militant movement was born. They started to "come out of the closet" to insist that sexual orientation is a matter of rights, power and identity. Within a few years gay pride marches were being held in numerous cities. The Latino movement emphasized pride in both Mexican past and the new Chicano culture and focused on the labor struggles that they faced. Cesar Chavez organized farm workers for labor rights and unions. The United Farm Workers Union was a civil rights movement and a campaign for economic betterment. The boycott drew national attention to the low wages and oppressive working conditions of migrant's laborers. The American Indian movement staged protests demanding greater tribal self-government and the restoration of economic resources guaranteed in treaties. Indian activists demanded not simply economic aid but self-determination. In the years that followed, many Indian tribes would win greater control over education and economic development on the reservations. Indian activists would bring land claims suits, demanding and receiving monetary settlements for past dispossession. Rachel Carson's publication of Silent Spring launched the environmental movement because it warned people about the use of DDT. The Sierra Club worked to preserve forests, saw its membership more than triple and other groups sprang into existence to alert the country of the dangers of water contamination, air pollution, lead in paint, and the extinction of animal species. On the first Earth Day, 20 million people participated in rallies, concerts, and teach-ins. All of these movements were very significant in the 60s because it allowed people to exercise their rights and fight for what they wanted and a lot was achieved from the movements.

What were the major achievements and failures of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations?

During Kennedy and Johnson Presidency their administrations had more successes than failures. To start off one of President Kennedy's administration first tasks was establishing the Peace Corps as a manner of countering communist influence in the world. The Peace Corps sent over 15,000 young men and women overseas by 1966 to assist in the economic and educational progress of developing countries in turn improving the image of the United States. The next success was based off the space race, when sputnik was launched in 1961 Kennedy promptly declared that the America would land a man on the moon by the end of the decade, which the United States did in 1969. Later on the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 was a success when President Kennedy imposed a blockade of on the island of Cuba after finding out that the Soviet Union was installing missiles that were capable of reaching the United States. After having intense negotiations with Soviet Union's leader Nikita Khrushchev they finally agreed on withdrawing the missiles from Cuba and the United States agreed on not invading Cuba as well as removing the Jupiter missiles America had in Turkey. The next achievement was the Voting Rights act of 1965, after Martin Luther King Jr's voting rights march from Selma to the state capital in Montgomery, Alabama. This march turned into a government violence against nonviolent demonstrators and was televised around the world. In response President Johnson asked congress to enact a law that secured their right to vote and congress did so very quickly. Following Johnsons call for a voting rights act his initiatives of 1965 to 1967 known as the "Great Society" called for a response to prosperity rather than depression as the New Deal had done. Within the Great Society programs such as Medicare and Medicaid were created to provide health services to the poor and elderly. A few other initiatives that the great society provided was federal funds for education and urban development. Agencies like Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the National Endowments for the Humanities and for the arts and a national public broadcasting network were also created. Days after President Kennedy's assassination Johnson wasted no time in addressing congress to enact a civil right bill after he took office in 1964. In that same year congress passed the Civil Rights Act that prohibited racial discrimination in employment, hospitals, schools restaurants, hotels, and theaters. Not only did the Civil Rights Act give freedom to the blacks but it also banned discrimination against sex therefor giving women the freedom they had also longed for. Now to start off some of the failures of Kennedy and Johnsons administrations was the Bay of Pigs. In 1961 President Kennedy sent CIA officials into Cuba in attempt to topple Castro's government. During this mission 100 men were killed and over 1,100 were capture. This became a huge loss for his administration because not only did they lose a lot of American lives but they also failed at weakening the ties that Cuba had with the Soviet Union and preventing communism from spreading. Another pretty big failure of these two administrations was the Vietnam War. This war was not only a failure because of what was going on overseas but also because if the negative effects it had within the states by 1968. It had sidetracked the Great Society and it tore families, universities and the Democratic Party apart. By that same year there was well over half a million American troops in Vietnam and the war only became more and more brutal the longer it kept going. No matter how many men and how many bombs the United States kept dropping in Vietnam the war did not seem to progress in the American favor because they couldn't break Vietcong & North Nam's ability to fight.

How did the civil rights movement change in the late 1960s?

Later in the 1960s Malcolm X became a very well-known activist for African American civil rights. Unlike in the early 1960s civil rights movement and Martin Luther King Jr's way of protesting, Malcolm X wanted to take a more aggressive and militant form of protest. Before Malcolm X became an activist he was actually a criminal and drug addict who was arrested on petty theft charges, but while he was in jail he converted to Islam and looked at himself as a Black Muslim. Malcolm X was not always called this, his surname was Malcolm little and changed the "little" to "X" as a way to reject slave history. In the time of Malcolm X, the slogan that he came up with was this idea of "Black Power" which was just a way to express black pride. It was also a way to "reject white society" which was an idea that Malcolm X saw as a positive form of segregation taken from an African American standpoint. This slogan also suggested things like the election of more black officials and also the belief that black Americans were a colonized people whose freedom could be won only through revolutionary struggle for self-determination. This powerful slogan also inspired the establishment of black-operated local schools which would emphasize African American pride. This is a significant contribution to the civil rights movement because it demanded a more militant form of civil rights movement but it also made a controversial point within the civil rights movement because of the two conflicting views of fighting against discrimination. The problem with the urban uprising was that it brought even more racism and discrimination these created riots between angry blacks and white cops and the first riots erupted in Harlem, 1964. After this, there was the Watt riot in Los Angeles which was a much larger scale riot that occurred due to Johnson's signing of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. This riot consisted of over 50,000 people who attacked police and firemen, looted white-owned businesses, and burned buildings. This riot required 15,000 police officers and National Guardsmen to restore order and after the damage was done 9 people were dead, over 900 were injured and $30 million worth of property had been destroyed. And lastly, after the assassination of MLK it created a movement called the Chicago Freedom Movement whose goal was to end discrimination by employers and unions, equal access to mortgages, the integration of public housing, and the constriction of low-income housing. Now after these riots, there was extreme white backlash as a result. Many whites left urban style living areas and moved to the suburbs, over 900,000 whites to be exact.