Ch 23

The 1920’s

EQ’s

• What were the promises and limits of prosperity in the 1920s?

• How and why did the Republican Party dominate 1920s politics?

• How did the new mass media reshape American culture?

• Which Americans were less likely to share in postwar prosperity and why?

• What political and cultural movements opposed modern cultural trends.

1920’s Weight Loss

Economics

Business Doctrine

Death of TR (1919)

War Disillusionment

Return of “old guard”

conservative Republicanism

Business Prosperity 1920’s

Supply side factors Demand side factors

Increased productivity -Taylorism -Mass production -Business innovation

Stock market wealth effect -Buying on margin

Technology -Oil and electricity -Improved infrastructure -Automobile production

Easy consumer credit

Government Policy -High tariffs -Anti labor -”welfare capitalism” and “open shop” -Government spending -Supply-side economics

Easy business credit

Consumer borrowing

Business Prosperity 1920’s Supply side factors Demand side factors

Increased productivity -Taylorism -Mass production -Business innovation

Stock market wealth effect -Buying on margin

Technology -Oil and electricity -Improved infrastructure -Automobile production

Easy consumer credit

Government Policy -High tariffs -Anti labor -”welfare capitalism” and “open shop” -Government spending -Supply-side economics/low taxes

Easy business credit

What happens when you have this sort of imbalance?

Farm Problems

• What led to artificially high farm prices between 1916-18?

• How did they finance increased production?

• Impact of technology?

Other sick industries – why?

The Politics of the Boom

All the presidents of the 1920s were Republican

Republicans also controlled the Congress

Warren G. Harding 1921-1923 (died in office)

Calvin Coolidge 1923-1929

Herbert Hoover 1929-1933

Warren G. Harding

Newspaper magnate

Fordney-McCumber Tariff (1922)

Bureau of Budget

Reduced income tax

Pardoned Debs

“Ohio Gang”

“Teapot Dome”

Harding is considered one of the worst Presidents in U.S. History

Teapot Dome

Calvin Coolidge

• Harding’s VP • Gov of MA • Boston Police Strike • Restored confidence • “The business of America

is business. The man who builds a factory builds a temple. The man who works there worships there.”

• “When more and more people are thrown out of work, unemployment results”

“Coolidge Prosperity”

1920’s Social/Cultural – The Jazz Age

1920’s Politics of Prosperity

1. 1920’s Republican position on the following and provide example:

– Tariffs

– Taxes

– Fiscal policy

– Govt regulation of business

– Labor

What is the symbolism of this picture?

Age of Automobile

Consumerism

Air Travel

Pop Heroes

Jack Dempsey

Movies

Women • At home

• At work

• Morality

• Divorce

• Activism – League and NWP

Bullets

1. What are the impacts of consumerism on American culture? – Bullet – Bullet

2. Evaluate the importance of the automobile on the U.S. economy. – Bullet – Bullet

3. What was the most significant political change in 1920’s? – Bullet – Bullet

Religion – Revival on the Radio

Religion

• Modernism vs Fundamentalism

– Scopes Trial

The “Lost Generation”

Art and Architecture

The Harlem Renaissance

• Harlem

Renaissance—

African-American

literary, artistic

movement

– express pride in African-

American experience

• Jazz becomes popular

Marcus Garvey

Prohibition

• Why?

• Enforcement

Organized Crime

Nativism

• Reasons

– Catholics and Jews

– Prejudice

– Jobs

– Extremists

Quota Acts of 1921 (3%/1910) and 24 (2%/1890)

The Ballad of Sacco and Vanzetti

Sacco and Vanzetti

Significance?

KKK Resurgence

$4.05 per week or 7 and 4/11 cents an hour, for 55 hours

Foreign Policy – Isolationist?

• Five Power Treaty

• Four Power Treaty

• Nine Power Treaty

• Kellogg-Briand Pact

– What did it do?

– Successful?

Problem: The US insists that all allied war debts are repaid. Germany isn’t able to pay the allies the reparations

they owe; thus, how can the allies pay the US?

Dawes Plan