1) New Deal and People of Color 2) World War II: The “Good War”?

1. 1) New Deal and People of Color2) World War II: The “Good War”? April 24, 2012

2. Announcements • The PowerPoint for last Thursday (April 19) will be posted soon. • I’ll hold a make-up office hour today (April 24) 11:30-1:00. • Midterm instructions and possible essay prompts will be posted by next Tuesday (May 1) or earlier. • I’ve posted instructions about the paper on the book about the Scopes Trial here. • I suggest that you look at the instructions soon and decide if you want to do this paper, due May 1 or 2 in your discussion section. No late papers for this assignment will be accepted.

3. Some Websites on the U.S. and World War II • Hyperwar --huge WW2 website • Advertising the Good War: US Propaganda Posters exhibit • PBS Website on Conscientious Objectors to the “Good War” • Exhibits on Japanese-American internment: • Children of the Camps, PBS website • Detailed, illustrated history of Manzanar camp • Photographs of Japanese internment by the famous photographer Dorothea Lange • Photographs of Manzanar by the famous photographer Ansel Adams

4. Liberalism, Race and Racism The Big Question: In American history, have democracy, equality and opportunity for white people depended on the oppression of people of color? In the 1930s, “New Deal Liberals” promoted policies to make the U.S. more democratic and equal. What did this mean for African Americans, Latinos and Native Americans?

5. “When Affirmative Action Was White” • New Deal government programs often—sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally—aided whites more than people of color and, in some cases, white women. • Some Examples: • Farm payments for restricting production displace sharecroppers • Wagner Act (1935) provided opportunities for labor union protections—but not for domestic workers or farm laborers. • Agricultural and other seasonal workers were not included in the minimum wage legislation first passed in 1938.

6. A Depression for African Americans? Changes Before the Depression The Great War and the Great Migration Nationalism and the Garvey Movement The Harlem Renaissance Depression, Poverty and Desperation

7. New Deal Programs and African Americans • Relief and Jobs • Limitations—Segregation and barriers to advancement • Roosevelt and the “Solid [white] South” • Black voters move from “The Party of Lincoln” to “The Party of FDR” African Americans in Civilian Conservation Corps camp

8. Evicted Sharecroppers

9. Eleanor Roosevelt, Personal Commitment and Civil Rights • Although the President would not support a Federal law against lynching, Eleanor spoke out and made her support clear. • At right—a letter to the head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People about anti-lynching legislation

10. Eleanor Roosevelt, Marian Anderson and the Daughters of the American Revolution “I have, as a rule, accepted my defeat and decided I was wrong or, perhaps, a little too far ahead of the thinking for the majority at that time. I have often found that the thing in which I was interested was done some years later. But in this case, I belong to an organization in which I can do no active work. They have taken an action which has been widely talked of in the press. To remain as a member implies approval of that action, and therefore I am resigning.” At right: She helped organize a massive Easter Sunday concert by Marian Anderson at the Lincoln Memorial

11. Racism and Protest • Saving the “Scottsboro Boys” • Industrial Unionism: The Congress of Industrial Organizations and African American Workers • Roots of the Modern Civil Rights Movement

12. The Scottsboro Defendants and their Lawyer

13. “Brownstones”, Jacob Lawrence, from his “Migration Series”

14. Poster for the Federal Negro Theater Project

15. “Scottsboro Limited”

16. Mexican Americans in the Depression • Migrations before the Great Depression • Community organization and mutual aid—the Mutualistas • Repatriation to Mexico—Surplus labor and racial discrimination

17. Mexican-American Women’s Mutualista—Texas 1911

18. A Journalist Describes Mexican Repatriation, 1933 “Social workers reported that many of the Mexicans who were receiving charity had signified their ‘willingness’ to return to Mexico…. It was discovered that, in wholesale lots, the Mexicans could be shipped to Mexico City for $14.70 per capita. This sum represented less than the cost of a week's board and lodging. And so, about February, 1931, the first trainload was dispatched, and shipments at the rate of about one a month have continued ever since.”–Carey McWilliams

19. Repatriation

20. From Repatriation to Reimportation • With the coming of World War II and labor shortages, farmers needed laborers. In 1942 the US instituted a program for importing workers, mostly from Mexico, on short-term contracts. • Below: Braceros at Oregon Labor Camp, 1940s

21. A New Deal for Indians? • Native Americans—First Americans, last to gain citizenship, in 1924 • Reservations and the land allotment system 1887-1934 • John Collier and the Indian Reorganization Act, 1934 • Restoring Indian land base • Recognizing Native American cultures • Supporting reservation self-government • Complexities and tensions in New Deal Indian policies—Navajo Livestock thinning

22. Early 20th century poster shows effects of individual landownership and unscrupulous land practices.

23. John Collier, New Deal Commissioner of Indian Affairs John Collier as Commissioner of the Office of Indian Affairs was a reformer, not a radical, but conservatives accused him of advancing “communism, atheism and un-Americanism” among Native Americans.

24. Indian Artist on WPA Project

25. Japanese Internment • Japanese-Americans on the West Coast • Fear of attack • Executive Order 9066, Feb. 1942 • Manzanar Relocation Camp in photo

26. Internment Camps USA

27. Images of Internment

28. Images of Internment

29. Images of Internment Dust Storm at Manzanar Internment Camp

30. Images of Internment Minidoka Camp

31. Life in the Internment Camps • Isolation and separation • Showing loyalty—Japanese-American volunteers • The “no-no boys”: 1943 questionnaire: 1)"Are you willing to serve in the armed forces of the United States on combat duty wherever ordered?" 2) "Will you swear unqualified allegiance to the United States of America and faithfully defend the United States from any or all attack by foreign or domestic forces, and forswear any form of allegiance or obedience to the Japanese emperor, to any other foreign government, power or organization?" • Gradual release, property loss and dislocation • Epilogue: The movement for redress and the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 • Justifying internment: US propaganda documentary 1943-- (9 ½ minutes)

32. “Why We Fight”: Morale and Propaganda on the Home Front

33. Images of the Enemy

34. Total War and the Economy Clockwise from top left: Aluminum worker; Grand Coulee Dam; Woman war worker—”Rosie the Riveter”; Ration Book

35. A War Economy • War as Depression Cure? • Growth of “Big Government” • Government spending and taxing • A “Military-Industrial Complex” • A Changing Labor Force • Fair Employment Practices Commission—Racial discrimination banned on Federal contracts • Women workers— “Rosie the Riveter” and others

36. Statistics on the War Economy FEDERAL BUDGET AND WORLD WAR II RevenueExpenditure • 1939             $ 6.6 billion                                                 $ 9.4 billion • 1945                50.2 billion                                                  95.2 billion UNEMPLOYMENT • 1940        14.1 % • 1944          1.2 % [March 2012: 8.2%] NATIONAL DEBT AS PERCENT OF TOTAL OUTPUT • 1940        43 % • 1945       123 % [2011 103%]* *By a more conservative measure, 69% PROPORTION OF WOMEN  IN PAID LABOR FORCE • 1940        19.4 % • 1945        36.3 % [2010 59%]