Conservative America Ascendant, 1973-1991

Chapter 30

The Rise of the New RightBarry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan: Champions of the Right

• Ronald Reagan (from CA) joined the Republican Party in the early 1960s as a speaker for candidates such as 1964 Republican Presidential nominee Barry Goldwater

The Conscience of a Conservative

• Like Reagan, Goldwater came from the Sunbelt (AZ)

• His book The Conscience of a Conservative set the foundation of the new Republican Party

• Criticized the New Deal as “absolutism” and criticized “containment” as being too timid

Grassroots Conservatives

• Because moderates controlled the Republican Party, winning the 1964 nomination for Goldwater required conservatives to build from the bottom up.

• Much support came from the Sunbelt: Orange County, CA, fast growing suburbs of Phoenix, Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, and other cities

• Phyllis Schlafly was a huge supporter of more aggressive conservatism in the Republican Party.

• Equal Rights Amendment opponent (Chapter 29)

• Accused Republicans of being Democrats in disguise

• Goldwater’s militant tone and Lyndon Johnson’s dedication to continue liberalism after Kennedy’s assassination was too much for him to even compete.

• However, much support grew in favor of Ronald Reagan as a candidate for the future

Free-Market Economics and Religious Conservatism• Conservatives ideological positions were: anti-communism, free-market economics, and religious

moralism

• William Buckley founder and editor of the National Review, used his magazine to criticize liberal policy

• Economist Milton Friedman promoted free market ideology

• Conservative Christians used politics and Republican Right to condemn: divorce, abortion, premarital sex, and feminism

• Charismatic televangelists Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell emerged as champions of a morality-based political agenda during the late 1970s

• A succession of conservative organizations would emerge in the 1980s

• A series of events that undermined support for the liberal agenda of the Democratic Party: the failed war in Vietnam; a judiciary that legalized abortion and pornography, enforced schools busing, and curtailed public expression of religion; urban riots; and stagnating economy

The Carter Presidential Interregnum

• Jimmy Carter’s unsuccessful presidency opened the door for Reagan’s election

• Human Rights in the State Department

• Withdrew economic and military aide from some oppressive regimes (Argentina, Uruguay, and Ethiopia)

• 1977 he signed a treaty to turn over the Panama Canal to Panama (December 31, 1999)

• Bad negotiations with Soviet president because of Soviet’s human rights violations

• SALT II

• Covert support for Mujahidin in

Soviet-Afghanistan conflict in 1978

Hostage Crisis

• Carter’s ultimate undoing came in Iran

• Since the 1940s the U.S. supported Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, ruler of Iran

• Assistance from CIA

• His crimes using secret police were overlooked by U.S.

• In 1979, a revolution drove the shah into exile and he was replaced by popular fundamentalist Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini

• The U.S. admitted Shah Pahlavi into the U.S. for cancer treatment

• Result

• Carter refused to negotiate

• Iraq’s invasion on Iraq lead Khomeini to negotiate and focus his attention on the invasion• November 1980 the hostages were finally released the day after Carter left office

The Election of 1980

• President ’s Carter’s ratings dropped to a historical low

• Economy

• Weak response to Soviet expansion

• Iran Hostage Crisis

• Ronald Reagan campaigned against liberal policies

• Against affirmative action, and forced busing

• With Reagan victory, Republicans controlled the senate

The Dawning of the Conservative AgeThe Reagan Coalition• The core of the Republican Party remained: affluent, white, Protestant voters who supported

balanced budgets, opposed government activism, feared crime and communism, and believed in strong national defense

• Suburban traditions of racial homogeneity, combined with the middle class comfort more inclined to support conservative public policies

• He attractive southern whites who were against civil rights. He validated 25 years of southern opposition to federal civil rights legislation

• The Religious Right were crucial to Republican victory

• Against abortion, called for voluntary prayer in schools, and mandatory death penalty for certain crimes

• Blue collar Catholics alarmed with antiwar protests and rising welfare expenditures and hostile to feminist demands supported Reagan

Conservatives in Power

Reaganomics

• Was a theory of underlying supply-side economics

• Reduce taxes of corporations and wealthy Americans, who could use the savings to expand production and create jobs

• Tax cuts now would create tax revenues later

• Economic Recovery Tax Act (ERTA)-

• For most Americans for 3 years

• Estate taxes and inheritances

• Corporations

• Could not cut New Deal policies

• Not based on economics, based on faith

• Military spending of Cold War created the biggest national debts since the Great Depression

• Rising deficit of the 1980s contradicted Reagan’s pledge of fiscal conservatism

Deregulation

• President Carter began deregulation in the 1970s but Reagan expanded the mandate to include cutting back on government protection of consumers, workers, and the environment

• EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) were undermined during the Reagan administration• Companies saved costs by refusing to clean up toxic waste and adhere to

safety regulations

• The Sierra Club, however aroused enough public outrage to change the administrations position in the late 80s

Remaking the Judiciary

• Reagan attempted to make the Supreme Court more conservative by 3 appointments. However, only one was truly conservative.• Limited reach of court ordered busing, and endorsing constitutional

protection of property rights• Did not overturn the liberal rulings of the Warren and Burger courts

(abortion, affirmative action, and rights of criminal defendants)

AIDS

• In the 80s AIDS killed nearly 100,000 people. However, early victims were gay men, thus Reagan, emboldened by New Right conservatives, hesitated in declaring a national health emergency

• In Reagan’s last years of office federal resources began to finally devote attention to treatment for HIV and AIDs patients and research.

• But the delay had proved costly, inhumane, and embarrassing

Morning in America

• Unemployment in 1981-1982 neared 10%, the highest rate since the Great Depression

• Combined with booming deficit, forced Reagan to negotiate a tax increase with Congress in 1982

Election of 1984

• Reagan’s remarkable ability to produce positive associations and feelings, alongside robust economic growth after the 1981-1982 recession, helped make the 1980s decade characterized by both backward-looking nostalgia and aggressive capitalism

Return to Prosperity

• By 1985 the U.S. imported more goods than it exported

• Heavy trade with japan

• Decline in productivity

• Economy grew because of financial services, medical services, computer technology- the service industry

Culture of Success

• Late 80s was popularized by the free market capitalist millionaires benefiting from Reaganomics• Lee Iacoca, Donald Trump, and Ivan Boesky were money celebrities

The Computer Revolution

• Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Steve Jobs, and Steve Wozniak were four entrepreneurs who pioneered the computer revolution in the late 1970s and 1980s

• They made the computer accessible to individual consumers

• IBM was the first personal computer in 1981

• Apple Corporation’s Macintosh computer became the

first run-away commercial success for a personal computer

• Gates and Allen founded Microsoft who soon

dominated the software industry

The End of the Cold WarU.S.-Soviet Relations in a New Era

• Reagan inherited a decade of détente that produced a relaxed tension with the Communist world.

Reagan’s Cold War Revival

• Reagan administration had a new strategy

• Abandon détente and rearm America

• Fund anticommunist movements in Angola, Mozambique, Afghanistan, and Central America

• Supported repressive corrupt right-wing regimes in Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador that ruled by military dictatorships that murdered, kidnapped, and tortured thousands of citizens

• It blocked Soviet influence but also damaged local communities and the international reputation of the U.S, as it did in the Vietnam war

Iran-Contra• Reagan considered Iran an “outlaw state” and supporter of terrorism

• However, he wanted Iran’s assistance in a hostage situation against Hezbollah, a pro-Iranian group in Lebanon

• To get Iran’s help, Reagan authorized the selling of weapons to Iran without congressional or public knowledge.

• In Nicaragua, the U.S. supported the anti-communist “Contra’s” overthrow of the democratically elected Sandinistas (Reagan accused them of threatening U.S. business interests)

• In 1984 Congress banned all government arms support of the Contras

• Oliver North, a lieutenant colonel of the Marines, under order of Reagan and high ranking officials used the profits from Iran deals and illegally assisted the Contras

• Reagans replied “I don’t remember” when asked if he knew of North’s actions

• North took the fall and was prosecuted

• The Iran-Contra scandal weakened Reagan domestically and he

proposed no bold domestic policy initiatives in his last two years.

Gorbachev and Soviet Reform• Soviet-Afghanistan war in 1979 was just as disastrous as the Vietnam War was for the

U.S.• Expensive, low military morale, undermined popular support for government

• Mikhail Gorbachev introduced policies of glasnost (openness) and perestroika (economic reform)

• Compromise to eliminate all intermediate-range nuclear missiles based in Europe

• Renewal of détente and lack of Soviet opposition to Eastern bloc dissent

• Berlin Wall was destroyed in 1989, symbolizing the end of Communism in Eastern Europe

• Internal conflict in Soviet government and failure of economy were the primary causes of the fall of the U.S.S.R.• U.S. played and important, but secondary role in the fall of the Soviet Union

• U.S. cost • $4 trillion, radiation from weapontesting, and anticommunist witch hunts

A New Political Order at Home and Abroad• Reagan’s legacy is mixed. His role in facilitating the end of the Cold War is his most important

achievement.

• His enormous military spending outweighed cuts in other programs

• He restored popular belief that America could enjoy increasing prosperity

Election of 1988

• George H. Bush, Reagan’s Vice President selected Indiana Senator, Dan Quayle as his running mate. Quayle would restore the Christian “family values” vote.

• Democrat Jessie Jackson became the first AA to challenge for a major party nomination.

• However, much less charismatic MA governor Michael Dukakis, emerged as the nominee

• The election confirmed a new pattern that would last through the turn of the

21st century. Every 4 years, Americans would have battles between liberals and conservatives

Middle East

• After Carter’s success negotiating the 1979 Egypt-Israel treaty at Camp David, there were not many bright spots in U.S. Middle Eastern diplomacy.

• In 1982, the Reagan administration supported Israel’s military occupation to destroy the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)

• Lebanese militants killed 241 U.S. marines in response, and Regan abruptly withdrew forces

Persian Gulf War

• In 1980 Reagan supported ruthless dictator of Iraq Saddam Hussein against Iran, in order to maintain supplies of Iraqi oil

• By 1988 Iran and Iraq signed an armistice

• In 1990 Hussein quickly conquered neighboring Kuwait to take their oil reserves and threatened Saudi Arabia

• To preserve Western access to oil, Bush initiated action to push out Iraq’s army

• The was quick and decisive but Hussein was kept in power