From Fair Deal to Great Society: US Domestic Policy, 1945-1969
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Flip to reveal answersWhat was Truman's domestic reform programme called?
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All 12 Flashcards — From Fair Deal to Great Society: US Domestic Policy, 1945-1969
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Question
What was Truman's domestic reform programme called?
Answer
The Fair Deal — an attempt to extend New Deal-style reforms after 1945.
Question
Name two Fair Deal measures that actually passed.
Answer
The Full Employment Act (1946) and a minimum wage rise to 75 cents an hour (1949); Social Security coverage was also extended.
Question
Why did Truman's national health insurance and civil rights bills fail?
Answer
A coalition of Republicans and conservative southern Democrats (Dixiecrats) blocked them in Congress.
Question
What is meant by Eisenhower's 'modern Republicanism'?
Answer
Keeping existing New Deal programmes in place while limiting further growth of the federal government.
Question
What was Eisenhower's most lasting domestic achievement?
Answer
The Interstate Highway Act (1956), funding 41,000 miles of highways, justified partly as Cold War defence infrastructure.
Question
When did Eisenhower use federal troops for civil rights, and why?
Answer
Little Rock, 1957 — he sent troops only after a state governor defied a federal court order to desegregate a school.
Question
What was Kennedy's domestic programme called?
Answer
The New Frontier.
Question
What happened to most of Kennedy's key bills (civil rights, Medicare, tax cut) before his death?
Answer
They remained stuck in Congress, blocked by the same conservative coalition that had frustrated Truman; most passed only after Kennedy's assassination, under Johnson.
Question
What was Johnson's domestic reform programme called, and what was its main goal?
Answer
The Great Society — aimed to end poverty and racial injustice in the United States.
Question
List three landmark Great Society laws and what each did.
Answer
Civil Rights Act (1964) banned discrimination in jobs and public places; Voting Rights Act (1965) outlawed literacy tests suppressing Black voters; Medicare/Medicaid (1965) gave health coverage to the elderly and the poor.
Question
Why was Johnson able to pass reforms that Kennedy could not?
Answer
His 1964 landslide gave him a larger, more unified congressional majority, he had deep Senate experience managing Congress, and he used the shock of Kennedy's assassination to build political pressure.
Question
How did the Vietnam War affect the Great Society?
Answer
Rising war spending and inflation drained money and political attention from domestic programmes, weakening support for the Great Society by the late 1960s.
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Topic 19.15 hub
Political developments in the United States (1945–1980) and Canada (1945–1982)
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