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The Rise of McCarthy: It was in the midst of this whole deal that Senator Joseph McCarthystarted waving around his lists of confirmed communists (they were really shopping lists,apparently). When this turned out to be a winning campaign issue, he stuck to it, and (for atime) seemed invulnerable. Julius & Ethel Rosenberg Case (1950): The Rosenbergs were accused of passing atomicsecrets to the USSR and were executed in 1953 (under Eisenhower). Internal Security (McCarran) Act (1950) – Targeted Communist front-group orgs. by forcingthem to register w/the gov’t and prohibiting them from holding defense jobs or traveling. Dennis et al. v. US (1951) – This SC decision upheld the Smith Act (1940), under which CPleaders had been arrested, due to the precedent set by Schenk v. US and the whole “clear andpresent danger” deal on free speech.- Then, under Eisenhower, there was more of the same. McCarthy continued his demagogic attacks, andEisenhower avoided confronting him lest it split the Republican Party. Additionally… Eisenhower attacked communists himself though a 1953 executive order that allowed federalworkers to be dismissed as “security risks.” Communist Control Act (1954): This act, which received widespread bipartisan support,effectively made membership in the CP illegal. Army-McCarthy Hearings (1954): McCarthy finally fell after he attacked the US army. In thehearings, his vile treatment of witnesses and general obnoxiousness got him condemned forsullying the dignity of the Senate.- E/t McCarthy finally fell the hysteria had already taken its toll on the American tradition of free speech.*The Civil Rights Movement*- The Cold War ended helping the civil rights movement b/c the US couldn’t make a big fuss about humanrights if it didn’t live up to its own ideals either. Additionally, the blacks that had migrated to the cities in WWIIbegan to control the political “balance of power” in the cities, and thus became important.- Subsequently Truman (in addition to genuinely believing in civil rights) had reasons to support it – in 1946,he created the President’s Committee on Civil Rights, which basically summed up the civil rightsmovement in their report To Secure These Rights (1947) – i.e. anti-lynching & anti-segregation laws.- Congress, however, didn’t act on the Committee’s suggestions – e/t Truman did in the end issue twoexecutive orders ending discrimination in the federal gov’t: one was on fair employment (Employment Boardof the Civil Service Commission), and the other desegregated the army (another committee to oversee).- A series of SC decisions also helped African Americans… NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund (Thurgood Marshall & Charles Hamilton Houston) workedagainst the separate but equal policies and got many blacks into universities. Smith v. Allwright (1944) – White-only Democratic Primaries in some states were outlawed. Morgan v. Virginia (1946) – No more segregation in interstate bus transportation.Shelley v. Kraemer (1948) – Outlawed agreements among white not to sell houses to blacks.Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) – The NAACP challenge to schoolsegregation succeeded on the grounds that separate facilities denied kids equal protectionunder the law (feeling of inferiority generated). Still, the SC didn’t order desegregation directlyuntil a year later, and even then there was no definite schedule, so Southern schools resisted.- In general, much of the South resisted the push towards civil rights – White Citizens’ Councils created toresist the school order – and Northern cities maintained a policy of segregation in terms of housing.- And the election of Eisenhower didn’t help as Ike ignored the issue (like he did everything else) hoping itwould gradually resolve itself – i.e. he objected to compulsory federal segregation laws, thereforeencouraging white noncompliance to orders through his lack of leadership.- Then in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957, the test of school integration occurred when whites tried to blockthe 8 black kids from entering Central High. In the end, Eisenhower was forced to send army paratroopers toensure their safety. In response, schools were closed for the following 2 years to avoid desegregation.- There was also the whole Rosa Parks and Montgomery Bus Boycott deal in 1955 – after Parks wasarrested, blacks under the leadership of MLK, a follower of Gandhi and advocate of non-violent protest,boycotted the buses until they were integrated – partially b/c of economic reasons and partially b/c of an SCdecision that declared the segregation laws unconstitutional.- Civil Rights Act (1957) – Created the US Commission Civil Rights to investigate discrimination, butproved ineffective.- As a result, blacks started a campaign of sit-ins in the South, which helped by giving their cause publicityand demonstrating the brutality of Southern Whites who attacked the non-violent protestors. The SNCC(Student Nonviolent Coordination Committee) was formed b/c of the sit-ins.*The 1950s: Comfort, Consumerism & Conformity*71