Chapter 14: Truman and
Eisenhower
Lesson 1
Return to a Peacetime Economy
• GI Bill: provided funds to
– establish businesses
– buy homes
– attend college
Beneficiaries of the GI Bill
Presidents: George H. W. Bush, Gerald Ford
Senators: Daniel Inouye, Bob Dole, John Warner, George
McGovern
Supreme Court Justices: William Rehnquist, John Paul
Stevens, Byron White
Pulitzer Prize winners: More than 20 writers and artists
Nobel Prize winners: Leon Lederman and 13 others
Famous Writers and Actors: Norman Mailer, Frank McCourt,
Rod Serling, Arthur Penn, Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, and
many others
450,000 engineers
240,000 accountants
238,000 teachers
91,000 scientists
67,000 doctors
22,000 dentists
17,000 journalists
more than one million lawyers, nurses, businessmen, artis
pilots, and other professionals
What do you think the people on this list have in
common?
Labor Issues
• High prices prompted many to want a
change…
• Republicans won control of both houses of
Congress in 1946
– Taft-Hartley Act- Outlawed closed shops
– Right To Work Laws- outlawed union shops
Problems with post war economy
• Increased consumer spending
• Higher prices
• Rising inflation
• Labor unrest
Truman’s Programs
• Expand Social Security benefits
• Raise minimum wage
• Civil Rights Bill
– Protect African Americans right to vote
– Abolish poll taxes
– Lynching would be a federal crime
– Most failed (Coalition of Southern Democrats
were against)
Election of 1948
Truman
• Traveled over 20,000 miles/ 200 speeches
• Supported by Laborers, African Americans and
Farmers
• Attacked Congress: “Do Nothing Congress”
– Because they did not pass his agenda
Election of 1948
Thomas Dewey: Republican
• Popular
• New York Governor
Truman won.. Did not win more than half of
popular vote
•
The Fair Deal
• Raise minimum wage to $0.75/hour
• Increased Social Security benefits
• National Housing Act of 1949– construction of low-income housing
– 1950- United States entered Korean War
• Ended Fair Deal
• War at a stalemate
• Truman did not run for reelection
Eisenhower Years
•
•
•
•
Republican
WWII War Hero
Former commander of Allied forces
Won in a landslide
Dynamic Conservatism
• Balancing economic conservatism with
activism to benefit the country
• Believed business growth vital to country
• Cut government spending
– Vetoed school construction bill
– Cut aid to public housing
– Abolished the Reconstruction Finance Corporation
• Loaned money to banks, railroads, other corporations
Extending Social Security
• Extended to an additional 10million people
• Extended unemployment payments to 4
million
• Provide more aid to farmers
• US back to a peacetime economy