Term
| Congressional elections of 1918 |
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Definition
| The 66th Congress, under President Wilson. He begged people to elect Democrats so that they could support his foreign policy initiatives in Congress, but the public rejected him. The senate had 47 Democrats and 49 Republicans and the House had 216 Democrats, 210 Republicans and 6 others. |
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Term
| Versailles Conference, Versailles Treaty |
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Definition
| The Palace of Versailles was the site of the signing of the peace treaty that ended WW I on June 28, 1919. Victorious Allies imposed punitive reparations on Germany. |
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Term
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Definition
| Led by Wilson, it fought for the inclusion of the 14 Points. Only one to be included was the League of Nations. |
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Term
| Big Four: Wilson, George, Clemenceau, Orlando |
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Definition
| Leaders of the four most influential countries after World War I - U.S., Britain, France and Italy, respectively. |
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Term
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Definition
| Devised by President Wilson, it reflected the power of large countries. Although comprised of delegates from every country, it was designed to be run by a council of the five largest countries. It also included a provision for a world court. |
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Term
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Definition
| An Article 10 provision of the League charter, it stated that if one country was involved in a confrontation, other nations would support it. Collective security is agreements between countries for mutual defense and to discourage aggression. |
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Term
| New Nations, self determination |
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Definition
| After WW I, Germany, Eastern Europe and the western portion of the former Russian Empire split into new countries. Wilson wanted them to have their own governments. |
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Term
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Definition
| As part of the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was ordered to pay fines to the Allies to repay the costs of the war. Opposed by the U.S., it quickly lead to a severe depression in Germany. |
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Term
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Definition
| A half-way system between outright imperial domination and independence, it was used to split Germany's empire after WW I. |
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Term
| Article 10 (Article X) of the Versailles Treaty |
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Definition
| Created the League of Nations. |
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Term
| Article 231 of the Versailles Treaty |
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Definition
| One of the more controversial articles, it dealt with the legal liability of Germany vs. the moral liability. |
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Term
| Senate rejection, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, reservations |
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Definition
| Lodge was against the League of Nations, so he packed the foreign relations committee with critics and was successful in convincing the Senate to reject the treaty. |
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Term
| "Irreconcilables": Borah, Johnson, LaFollette |
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Definition
| Some Senators would have been willing to support the League of Nations if certain reservations were made to the treaty. The "Irreconcilables" voted against the League of Nations with or without reservations. |
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Term
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Definition
| In 1919, the Communist Party was gaining strength in the U.S., and Americans feared Communism. In January, 1920, Palmer raids in 33 cities broke into meeting halls and homes without warrants. 4,000 "Communists" were jailed, some were deported. |
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Term
| Strikes: 1919, coal, steel, police |
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Definition
| In September, 1919, Boston police went on strike, then 350,000 steel workers went on strike. This badly damaged the unions. |
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Term
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Definition
| Caused by increased taxes and the government borrowing money directly from citizens. |
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Term
| Election of 1920: candidates, issues |
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Definition
| Republican, Warren G. Harding, with V.P. running mate Coolidge, beat Democrat, Governor James Cox, with V.P. running mate, FDR. The issues were WW I, the post-war economy and the League of Nations. |
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Term
| Brief depression, 1920-1921 |
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Definition
| Two years after WW I, prices went up and consumers stopped buying. Unemployment rose from 2% to 12% and industry and export trade halted. |
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Term
| Election of 1920: candidates, issues, vice-presidential candidates |
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Definition
| Republican, Warren G. Harding, with V.P. running mate Coolidge, beat Democrat, Governor James Cox, with V.P. running mate, FDR. The issues were WW I, the post-war economy and the League of Nations. |
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Term
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Definition
| Harding wanted a return to "normalcy" - the way life was before WW I. |
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Term
| Esch-Cummins Transportation Act |
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Definition
| Provided for the return of railroads to private control, widened powers of the Interstate Commerce Commission. |
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Term
| Harding scandals: Charles Forbes |
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Definition
| Forbes served time for fraud and bribery in connection with government contracts. He took millions of dollars from the Veteran's Bureau. |
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Term
| Harding scandals: Harry Daugherty |
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Definition
| Daugherty was implicated for accepting bribes. |
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Term
| Harding scandals: Secretary of the Interior Fall |
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Definition
| Fall leased government land to the oil companies (Teapot Dome Scandal) and was convicted of accepting a bribe. |
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Term
| Harding scandals: Teapot Dome |
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Definition
| 1929 - The Naval strategic oil reserve at Elk Hills, also known as "Teapot Dome" was taken out of the Navy's control and placed in the hands of the Department of the Interior, which leased the land to oil companies. Several Cabinet members received huge payments as bribes. Due to the investigation, Daugherty, Denky, and Fall were forced to resign. |
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Term
| Harding scandals: Harry Sinclair |
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Definition
| He leased government land to the oil companies and was forced to resign due to the investigation. He was acquitted on the bribery charges. |
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Term
| Harding's death, Coolidge takes over |
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Definition
| August 2, 1923 - President Harding died and Vice President Calvin Coolidge took over. |
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Term
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Definition
| Created in 1921, its primary task is to prepare the Annual Budget for presentation every January. It also controls the administration of the budget, improving it and encouraging government efficiency. |
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Term
| Secretary of the Treasury Mellon, tax cuts |
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Definition
| An American financier, he was appointed Secretary of the Treasury by President Harding in 1921 and served under Coolidge and Hoover. While he was in office, the government reduced the WW I debt by $9 billion and Congress cut income tax rates substantially. He is often called the greatest Secretary of the Treasury after Hamilton. |
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Term
| Senator George Norris (1861-1944), Muscle Shoals |
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Definition
| He served in Congress for 40 years and is often called the Father of the Tennessee Valley Authority, a series of dams and power plants designed to bring electricity to some of the poorest areas of the U.S., like Appalachia. |
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Term
| Election of 1924: candidates |
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Definition
| With Republican Coolidge running against Democrat Davis and Progressive LaFollette, the liberal vote was split between the Democrat and the Progressive, allowing Coolidge to win. |
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Term
| Robert M. LaFollette (1855-1925) |
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Definition
| A great debater and political leader who believed in libertarian reforms, he was a major leader of the Progressive movement from Wisconsin. |
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Term
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Definition
| The popular name of the "People's Party," formed in the 1890's as a coalition of Midwest farm groups, socialists, and labor organizations, such as the American Federation of Labor. It attacked monopolies, and wanted other reforms, such as bimetallism, transportation regulation, the 8-hour work day, and income tax. |
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Term
| McNary-Haugen Bill, vetos |
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Definition
| The bill was a plan to raise the prices of farm products. The government could buy and sell the commodities at world price and tariff. Surplus sold abroad. It was vetoes twice by Coolidge. It was the forerunner of the 1930's agricultural programs. |
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Term
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Definition
| Agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, it offered farmers insurance against loss of crops due to drought, flood, or freeze. It did not guarantee profit or cover losses due to bad farming. |
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Term
| Election of 1928: candidates, personalities, backgrounds |
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Definition
| Herbert Hoover, the Republican, was a Quaker from Iowa, orphaned at 10, who worked his way through Stanford University. He expounded nationalism and old values of success through individual hard work. Alfred E. Smith, the Democrat, was a Catholic from New York, of immigration stock and advocated social reform programs. |
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Term
| Bruce Barton, The Man Nobody Knows, 1925 |
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Definition
| Advertising executive Barton called Jesus the "founder of modern business" because he picked men up from the bottom ranks and built a successful empire. |
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Term
| Henry L. Mencken, editor of the magazine, The American Mercury |
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Definition
| In 1924, founded The American Mercury, which featured works by new writers and much of Mencken's criticism on American taste, culture, and language. He attacked the shallowness and conceit of the American middle class. |
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Term
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Definition
| Writer Gertrude Stein named the new literary movement when she told Hemingway, "You are all a lost generation," referring to the many restless young writers who gathered in Paris after WW I. Hemingway used the quote in The Sun Also Rises. They thought that the U.S. was materialistic and the criticized conformity. |
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Term
| F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby |
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Definition
| Most critics regard this as his finest work. Written in 1925, it tells of an idealist who is gradually destroyed by the influence of the wealthy, pleasure-seeking people around him. |
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Term
| Sinclair Lewis, Main Street, Babbit |
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Definition
| He gained international fame for his novels attacking the weakness in American society. The first American to win the Nobel Prize for literature, Main Street (1920) was a satire on the dullness and lack of culture in a typical American town. Babbit (1922) focuses on a typical small business person's futile attempts to break loose from the confinements in the life of an American citizen. |
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Term
| Theodore Dreiser, An American Tragedy |
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Definition
| Foremost American writer in the Naturalism movement, this book, written in 1925, criticized repressive, hypocritical society. It tells about a weak young man trying unsuccessfully to rise out of poverty into upper class society who is executed for the murder of his pregnant girlfriend. |
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Term
| Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms |
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Definition
| He received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954 and the Pulitzer Prize in 1952. A Farewell to Arms was written in 1929 and told the story of a love affair between an American ambulance driver and a British nurse in Italy during WW I. |
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Term
| T.S. Elliot, "The Waste Land" |
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Definition
| One of the most influential poets of the early 20th century, he had been born in St. Louis, Missouri, but moved to England after college and spent his adult life in Europe. The poem, written in 1922, contrasts the spiritual bankruptcy of modern Europe with the values and unity of the past. Displayed profound despair. Considered the foundation of modernist, 20th century poetry. |
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Term
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Definition
| An Austrian physician with new ideas on the human mind. One of the founders of the modern science of psychiatry, discovered the subconscious. Believed that the mind is divided into 3 parts: id - primitive impulse; ego - reason which regulates between the id and reality; and superego - morals. |
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Term
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Definition
| One of the first radio stations to pioneer in commercial radio broadcasting in 1920. By 1922 there were 508 radio stations. |
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Term
| Prohibition, Volstead Act, Al Capone |
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Definition
| Prohibition - 1919: the 18th Amendment outlawed the manufacture or sale of intoxicating liquors. Volstead Act - 1919: Defined what drinks constituted "intoxicating liquors" under the 18th Amendment, and set penalties for violations of prohibition. Al Capone: In Chicago, he was one of the most famous leaders of organized crime of the era. |
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Term
| Ku Klux Klan in the 1920's |
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Definition
| Based on the post-Civil War terrorist organization, the Invisible Empire of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan was founded in Georgia in 1915 by William Simmons to fight the growing "influence" of blacks, Jews and Catholics in US society. It experienced phenomenal growth in the 1920's, especially in the Midwest and Ohio Valley states. It's peak membership came in 1924 at 3 million members, but its reputation for violence led to rapid decline by 1929. |
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Term
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Definition
| Broad movement in Protestantism in the U.S. which tried to preserve what it considered the basic ideas of Christianity against criticism by liberal theologies. It stressed the literal truths of the Bible and creation. |
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Term
| Immigration Acts, 1921, 1924, Quota System |
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Definition
| 1921 - First legislation passed which restricted the number of immigrants. Quota was 357,800, which let in only 2% of the number of people of that nationality that were allowed in in 1890. 1924 - Limited the number of immigrants to 150,000 per year. |
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