1920S CULTURE CLASH

John Ermer

U.S. History Honors

Miami Beach Senior High

LACC.1112.RH.1.9, SS.912.A.5.1-10, SS.912.A.1-7,

SS.912.G.1-3, SS.912.G.4-3

PROHIBITION

1920: Eighteenth Amendment prohibits the manufacture, transport,

sale, and consumption of “intoxicating liquors”• Congress passes the Volstead Act to enforce Prohibition

• Only 1,500 federal prohibition agents hired to enforce law, local cops help little

• Law not enforced well, illegal alcohol is widely available• Criminals now make fortunes in trade of illegal alcohol, rise in crime

Prohibition loses support of urban middle class due to organized

crime• Many rural, Protestant “drys” fight back against “wet” urbanites

Prohibition repealed in 1933 by the Nineteenth Amendment

IMMIGRATION

After WWI, immigrants associated with radicalism (Sacco &

Vanzetti)• Many nativists use this perception to fight for immigration

control• Emergency Immigration Act of 1921 sets quotas on

immigration

National Origins Act of 1924 strengthens 1921 quotas• Quotas based on 1890 census population (3% of 1890 numbers)• Angers Japanese who understood selves as targets (Chinese

already illegal)• Law favors immigration by northern Europeans

NATIVISM

1915: New Ku Klux Klan established at Stone Mountain, Georgia• D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation helps KKK’s cause, recruiting• At first, Klan most concerned with “insubordinate” African-Americans

Primary targets of 1920s Klan = Catholics, Jews, and “foreigners”• New focus makes Klan popular outside the South, moves North & West• Defended what it called “traditional values”

• Worked for Bible readings in schools, terrorized divorced women/men

Klan membership in declines after 1925 due to scandals & infighting

RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM

American Protestantism divided b/w modernists & fundamentalists• Fundamentalists insisted on literal translation of the Bible• Fundamentalists fight against teaching of Evolution in schools

Fundamentalist evangelists spread message to new groups w/ revivals• In some Southern and Western states, Fundamentalists gain political power• Some states (including Tenn.) outlaw the teaching of Evolution in public schools

The Scopes “Monkey” Trial• ACLU and Tenn. biology teacher John Scopes fight against Tenn. Law• Famous attorney Clarence Darrow defends Scopes against W. J. Bryan• Scopes loses the trial, but fundamentalists were made to look foolish

Fundamentalists marginalized from mainstream churches & politics, start own

churches

DEMOCRATIC POLITICS

Democratic Party really a loose coalition of groups with different

ideas• Rural prohibitionists, Klansmen, and fundamentalists• Urban immigrants, urban workers, and Catholics

1924 Democratic convention shows disunity of party, lose election

1928: Al Smith, northern Irish Catholic, wins Democratic

nomination• First democrat since Civil War not to win entire South

Republican Herbert Hoover wins Election of 1928

REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT

1921-1933: Republicans hold both the Presidency and

Congress

Warren G. Harding is “man of limited talents from a small

town”• Limited intellect, uneventful political career, gambler,

drinker, womanizer• William Daugherty and the Ohio Gang—party cronyism• Teapot Dome Scandal

• Sec. of Interior Albert Hall extorts money from naval oil reserves—convicted

• Harding dies in San Francisco, succeeded by Calvin Coolidge• Coolidge is opposite of Harding, known as “Silent Cal,” but

takes same passive approach to the presidency—wins reelection in 1924

GOVERNMENT & BUSINESS

Goal of Harding and Coolidge administrations = help

business efficiency• Secretary of Treasury Andrew Mellon enacts plan toward

this goal• Lower taxes on corporate profits, personal income, and

inheritance• Shrinks the federal budget

• Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, views self as a progressive• Believes corporations should cooperate with one another with

gov’t help• Concept known as “Associationalism”• Businesses help other businesses to stabilize and

promote efficiency• Elected president in 1928 on a progressive platform