Chapter 23

Roaring Twenties

1920’s Republican Presidents

• Warren Harding (1920)- “Return to normalcy” - Teapot Dome Scandal

• Calvin Coolidge (1923)- VP becomes President when Harding dies.

• Herbert Hoover(1928)Beats Dem Al Smith (Catholic)

• All pro business and isolationist. End of progressivism.

Red Scare 1919-1920

• After Russian Revolution, Americans fear communist takeover in the U.S.

• Results– Attacks on labor unions – Attacks on immigrants – Palmer Raids- Attorney General Mitchell Palmer

rounded up immigrants and deported them with little evidence

Immigration RestrictionEmergency Quota Act in 1921

set the quota for the number of immigrants who could come from a certain place to 3% of the people of their nationality who lived in the US in 1910.

Immigration Restriction

Immigration Act of 1924 Now it would be 2% of the people of their nationality that were in the United States in 1890.

Canadians and Latin Americans were exempt from this quota system.

Immigration from Japan was cut off completely.

Return to Isolationism

• Washington Naval Conference (1922)- The U.S. and Britain would have equality in Battleships and Aircraft Carriers and Japan would have fewer. Ratio was 5-5-3.

• U.S. & Britain won’t fortify Far East possessions.

Return to Isolationism• Dawes Plan (1924)- the U.S. loans money to Germany so

that they could pay their debt to the Allies who could then pay their debt to the U.S.

Return to Isolationism

• Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928)- 62 nations including U.S. make war illegal.

• Pact fails when Japan invades China.

Prohibition = The noble experiment

• The big failed experiment of the 1920’s was prohibition. It was established by the 18th amendment, and the Volstead Act in 1919 was passed to enforce it.

Prohibition = The noble experiment

• Local bars were replaced by private drinking clubs called speakeasies. The women who visited these clubs for drinking, smoking, and dancing were called flappers.

Prohibition = The noble experiment

Prohibition created a wave of crime and gangsters. Al Capone of is the most famous gangster of this time.

Modern vs. Traditional America• Religion vs. Science• A biology teacher in Tennessee John Scopes deliberately

broke the law against teaching evolution in order to challenge it in court.

• The Scopes Trial was commonly referred to as the “monkey trial.” Scopes was found guilty for teaching evolution in Tennessee.

New Negro/Harlem Renaissance

• Great Migration of African-Americans to the North for better jobs and treatment continued.

• Harlem became the political, intellectual, and cultural center for what was called the “new negro.” The Harlem Renaissance is the name given to all of the black creativity of this time.

New Negro/Harlem Renaissance

• There was a political side to the “new negro” as well.• Marcus Garvey-“Blacks should be proud of being black”• Universal Negro Improvement Association

New Negro/Harlem RenaissanceGarvey’s most famous project was the Black Star Line, a black owned and operated fleet of ships. It was part of the Back To Africa movement which tried to help people of African descent return to their homelands. The Black Star Line went bankrupt and Garvey was found guilty of Fraud and went to jail.

• A symbol of the can do attitude of Americans in the 1920’s was Charles Lindbergh who became the first person in the world to fly a solo- nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean.