Professional Documents
Culture Documents
SIGNIFICANCE of Event/Idea
Proposition 13 (1978):
Citizens increasingly balked at paying the bills for further extension of government benefits. After four decades of advancing New
Deal and Great Society programs, a strong countercurrent took hold. Californians staged a tax revolt in 1978 (known by its
ocial ballot title of Proposition 13) that slashed property taxes and forced painful cuts in government services. The California
tax quake jolted other state capitals and even rocked the pillars of Congress in faraway Washington, D.C.
-Free markets made free peoples and that shrinking government meant keeping nations safer from communism
Positives and Negatives of supply side economics (also known as trickle-down economics)
Ronald Reagan
Republican
(1981-1989)
-Supply-siders argued that a combination of budgetary discipline and tax reduction would stimulate new investment, invigorate
productivity, foster dramatic economic growth, and eventually even boost rather than deplete tax revenues, thus reducing the federal
deficit.
-The economy slid into its deepest recession since the 1930s. Unemployment reached nearly 11 percent in 1982, businesses folded,
and several bank failures jolted the nations entire financial system.
-The supply-siders seemed to be vindicated when a healthy economic recovery finally got under way.
How did Reagan increase tensions during the Cold War period (937-938)-SDI and Star Wars.
-His strategy for dealing with Moscow was simple: by enormously expanding U.S. military capabilities, he could threaten the
Soviets with a fantastically expensive new round of the arms race. The American economy, theoretically, could better bear this
new financial burden than could the creaking Soviet system.
-Popularly known as Star Wars, the plan called for orbiting battle stations in space that could fire laser beams or other forms of
concentrated energy to vaporize intercontinental missiles on lifto.
Glasnost, or openness, aimed at ventilating the secretive, repressive stuness of Soviet society by introducing free speech and
a measure of political liberty. Perestroika, or "restructuring", was intended to revive the moribund Soviet economy by adopting
many of the free market practices- such as the profit motive and an end to subsidized prices- of the capitalist west. Both of these
required that the Soviet Union shrink the size of its enormous military machine and redirect its energies to the dismissal civilian
economy. That necessitated an end to the Cold War.
Ronald Reagan had taken oce vowing to invigorate the American economy by rolling back government regulations, lowering taxes,
and balancing the budget. He did ease many regulatory rules, and he pushed major tax reform bills through Congress in 1981 and
1986. But a balanced budget remained grotesquely out of reach. Supply-side economic theory had promised that lower taxes would
actually increase government revenue because they would stimulate the economy as a whole. But, in fact, the combination of tax
reduction and huge increases in military spending opened a vast revenue hole of $200 billion annual deficits. In his eight years in
oce, President Reagan added nearly $2 trillion to the national debtmore than all of his predecessors combined.
What were the goals and beliefs of the Moral Majority (942-945)?
The Moral Majority was against sexual permissive- ness, abortion, feminism, and the spread of gay rights.What had in the
past been personal mattersgender roles, homosexuality, and prayerbecame the organizing ground for a powerful political
movement. They declared themselves Christian or Prolife voters.
Impact of Roe v. Wade and associated cases. How was Roe v. Wade a continuation of the
feminist movement of the late 1960s and 1970s?
The contentious issue of abortion also reached the Court in 1989. In the case of Roe v. Wade in 1973, the Supreme Court had
prohibited states from making laws that interfered with a womans right to an abortion during the early months of pregnancy. In
Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, the Court in 1989 seriously compromised Roes protections by approving a Missouri law
that imposed certain restrictions on abortion. Further inviting states to legislate in an area in which Roe had once seemed to forbid
them, the Court ruled in 1992s Planned Parenthood v. Casey that states could restrict access to abortion as long as they did not
place an undue burden on the woman. This is a continuation of feminism for it shows a debate of the rights of women to an
abortion. The argument raised questions as to the rights of women in regard to their unborn children.
Republican
(1989-1993)
End of the Cold War: Tiananmen Square (1989), Eastern Europe, Gorbachev
Long oppressed by puppet regimes propped up by Soviet guns, the region was revolutionized in just a few startling months in 1989.
The Solidarity movement in Poland led the way when it toppled Polands communist government in August. With dizzying speed,
communist regimes collapsed in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, and even hyperrepressive Romania. In December 1989,
jubilant Germans danced atop the hated Berlin Wall, symbol of the division of Germany and all of Europe into two armed and hostile
camps.The wall itself soon came down, heralding the imminent end of the forty-five-year-long Cold War. In China hundreds of
thousands of prodemocracy demonstrators thronged through Beijings Tiananmen Square in the spring of 1989. They proudly
flourished a thirty-foot-high Goddess of Democracy, modeled on the Statue of Liberty, as a symbol of their aspirations.
Impacts: Most Americans cheered the wars rapid and enormously successful conclusion. Many people echoed President
Bushs sentiments when he declared, By God, weve kicked the Vietnam Syndrome once and for all!
1980-1989
Smaller government
By the 1980s, the public had grown tired of the new deal and great society and were
ready to slash bills
Tax reforms
Eects of Reaganomics
Gap widens between rich and poor (first time in 20th century), middle class income
stagnated
The religious right was made up of people who were increasingly angry at many of
the cultural trends of the 80s and 90s
1980s religious conservatives similar to liberal protesters of the 60s and was a
reaction to social changes from the 60s
Reagan brought a new tactic- a massive arms race to outspend the soviets "peace
through strength"
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI)- "Star Wars"- orbiting battle stations, laser beams,
astrodome over the US
Israel strains relations by allowing Jewish settlers to settle West Bank/ gaza strip
(Palestinian claimed) and then invaded Lebanon
Reagan verbally attacks Sandinista rebels as covering for soviets/ Cuban military
entering the region and supporting rebels in El Salvador
1985- Mikhail Gorbachev become the reform minded leader of the Soviet Union
Glasnost or "openness" which aimed to introduce free speech and political liberty to
the Soviet Union
Perestroika or "Restructuring" which meant that the soviets would adopt free market
economies similar to those in the west
Reagan and Gorbachev have summit meetings (4) to reduce missiles (1+2 were
discussion and some posturing, 3+4 included treaties)