AP US History Review Book: Study Guide and Practice Test Questions for the AP US History Exam (Guide to 5) by Accepted Inc

Author:Accepted Inc [Accepted Inc]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Accepted, Inc.
Published: 2020-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

The Great Society

As awareness of civil rights issues grew, so too did an awareness of poverty in America, as well as the weaknesses in the public sector. In 1958, John Galbraith wrote The Affluent Society . According to Galbraith, private industry was growing wealthier in America, while the public sector was becoming poorer. This was increasing the gap between rich and poor. Galbraith’s work influenced later social policy.

In 1960, President Kennedy used the term New Frontier in his presidential acceptance speech, which became a label for his social and domestic policies aimed at reducing poverty and infrastructure investment.

After President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas in November, 1963, Lyndon B. Johnson assumed the presidency and launched a large series of social programs, which he called the Great Society , to reduce poverty and hunger in America. Johnson’s programs had broad legislative support, with eighty-four of eighty-seven passed into law.

These included the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, as well as the creation of the National Endowment for the Humanities, Job Corps, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and expansions to Social Security that created Medicare and Medicaid.

The Voting Rights Act allowed the federal government to provide support for and enforce voters’ rights, including an end to individual states’ restrictive measures.

Immigration laws were reformed in 1965 with the Immigration and Nationality Act. It addressed the needs of specific immigrant and refugee communities, including Cubans and Filipinos, gave foreign nationals a “pathway to citizenship,” and did away with quotas, allowing more people from around the world to move to America in search of opportunity.

These new attitudes extended beyond Johnson’s Great Society. In the Supreme Court, cases supporting individual rights changed how Americans view the law. Griswold v. Connecticut supported privacy rights, particularly in regard to married couples and contraception; however, the decision has been applied more broadly. The Miranda v. Arizona decision specified the terms of police procedure and required that police notify suspects of their rights; these are now called Miranda Rights .

Later in this period, an interest in the well-being of the planet’s environment grew. Some of these values were shared with traditional conservationists, but others were more significantly concerned with the damage done by private businesses, including large-scale agriculture. Writer and activist Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring , helped to redefine the environmental movement in the modern world, building on the work of great American conservationists throughout history, such as Thomas Jefferson, Henry David Thoreau, Teddy Roosevelt, and more. In terms of public policy, industrial pollution was the most significant concern in this period. The Clean Air Act of 1970 set limits on industrial emissions for the first time.

Many of these actions were quite liberal, as they used public policy and government regulation to achieve social change. The large number of liberal reforms passed combined with a strong counterculture movement led to a conservative backlash. Conservative groups questioned and objected to governmental social engineering, preferring that social welfare remain part of the private sphere.

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