American History Research Paper (Research Paper Sample)

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American History
Chapter #25
The Great depression was a condition when the United States and its citizens had almost lost everything. For example, most families were homeless, and children were starving. The condition made Americans feel that the President was not doing anything to help them out of these conditions. As to their expectation, they wanted the former to hand in handouts to them for them to be relieved. To their dismay, he did not consider this approach and thus, the citizens and the serving President lost touch. All this occurred during the reign of President Hoover, who was the 31st American President.
In relation to the lost touch between President Hoover and the citizen, Roosevelt campaigned for that seat, and won the election of the presidency in 1933, thereby becoming the 32nd President of the United States of America. He inaugurated a new deal in response to the Great Depression facing the country. The citizens viewed him as the hope of reviving the lost economic glory of America. The new deal focused on 15 programs, which aimed at relief, recovery and reform. Relief entailed solving the problem of unemployment and poverty; recovery was to deal with the realignment of economic conditions back to normalcy, and reform was to ensure that the system of finance prevents further depression for the American people, Fitzgerald (13).
The new deal played an effective role in improving the economic condition of Great Depression of United States. It is eluded from the fact that it provided realignment in the political situation of America that made the Democratic Party be a majority party. Similarly, the new deal enabled farmers to supply extra food to the European allies. In addition, it enabled factories to create war materials used in the fighting of the World War II. Further, it led to the creation of more jobs within the entire period, Fitzgerald (14).
In relation to the above content, the new deal gets a score of 10 (high) in being effective in improving the economic condition of the Great Depression. The new deal helped in addressing the pertinent issues affecting United States at this time and should be accredited for its accomplishment.
Chapter #27
The Second World War began in 1939 and ended in 1945. The two years have significant underpinnings in the revolution of United States. Each year has its independent features, which makes it comparative to another year. Therefore, the comparison of United States of America is made in relation to the period at which the Second World War began and at the time when the war ended. It is because the United States was directly involved in this war.
In 1939, there are significant features, which mark a distinctive comparison in relation to 1945. During that time, the new deal was in its full implementation by the government. Therefore, there was permanent support of agricultural programs by the government. It led to surplus production of agricultural commodities. The rate of unemployment came down to less than 10%. In addition, there was massive spending by the government in war-related activities. Therefore, there was a marked and significant doubling of the economic growth rates of the United States by masking the effects of economic depression or by ending the depression itself. Further, United States turned into a socialite state.
In contrast to 1945, which served as the post-war period for the United States, the federal government increased to $95.2 billion. The deficit of the federal also rose. The growth in the established federal responsibility for defense and the assumption of new tasks resulted in a rapid growth in staff, income tax, and higher corporate taxes. In addition, there was increased taxation, inflation and economic growth that created a tendency for revenues to rise automatically as an individual’s income moved into higher tax category, French (25). In relation to this, it implies that the war helped the United States to regain its prosperity and be consolidated as the world’s richest country at this time.
The significant comparison made between the two years that are; at the dawn of Second World War and the post-Second World War clearly depicts the kind of state that the American society was at that time. Similarly, it clearly indicates the impact that the war played on the United States.
Chapter #28
The major ideals of the American society are entwined in liberalism and constitutionalism. The United States contributed to subjecting the Soviet Union to a series of multiple pressures because of Cold War. First, the Soviet Union was subjected to a prospective success of its own normalization in relations with the Federal Republic, pressure applied by its own ally Poland, and the prospect of an overall West-East settlement that was being held out as a possibility through the proposed European Security Council, (Mayall and Navari 59).
The involvement of United States in this Cold War affected negatively on its ideals. It infringed the sovereignty of the other country’s affairs thus compromising its foreign affairs with this state. It is because it showed both the strength and weakness of the western powers that there could be no formal territorial revision of the post-war European settlement. Therefore, this made United States a better world power.
Chapter #29
The period between 1946 to 1960 is referred to as a post-war period. During this period, most governments including the United States were devising ways that could enable them extract more resources directly or indirectly from its citizens to meet their financial budgets. Therefore, this period was not a happy period for various categories of citizens. French (25) highlights that a major facilitating factor in the expansion of governments was access to resources. The main revenue sources varied between the different levels of governments with property tax being the major source of local government income.
In United States, various projects needed direct funding from the government. However, the government did not have enough resource for their funding. For instance, various post-war planners were advocating federal aid to education. As a result, the expansion of schooling was a major element in the rapid growth of local and state expenditure. In addition, the local elites who dominated the post-war planning also supported the construction of roads and hospitals that attracted funding from the federal. Further. Indeed, there was an influential lobby of car and road interest with little opposition French (27).
Therefore, all the federal expenditure relied on revenue collected by the government. In the end, the entire citizens are the ones who were taxed by the government in order to facilitate these projects. The taxation varied among citizens with those whose job’s brackets were higher being taxed more than those whose jobs brackets were lower than those with higher jobs brackets. Income tax accounted for the general government revenues. Sales tax contributed rather more to state government revenues over the post-war period.
In general, the period between 1946 to 1960 was not a time of happy days for ordinary American since they were taxed in whichever category they were serving. Similarly, it is because of the features that were accustomed in relation to the government’s functions and supplied incentives for further accretions.
Chapter #30
The period of 1960’s was of great turmoil to the United States since it was a time full of protests, dissent and upheaval socially, politically and culturally. The period began with the optimism carried over from the 1950’s and shared by the newly elected leaders like J.F Kennedy. However, the assassination of President J.F Kennedy and the expansion of the Cold War policy of containment to control the spread of communism shattered the optimism. Many people challenged the government policies, values and middle-class lifestyle. The period was marked with significant expansion in education, and these protests found their way in colleges and universities. The youth of the 1960s was a lot different from the 1950s lot. The middle-class college students became active participants in civil rights, protest movements and the counterculture bringing the social and political turmoil into the quite peaceful colleges and universities. The social groupings and protests advocated radical changes in the American society and politics.
Similarly, the 1960s was a time of great turmoil in United States. The United States civil rights movement, led by Martin Luther King (Junior) was fighting to end segregation and racism in America. The women movements fought to ensure that the U.S women received the same rights as their male counterparts. These movements constituted criticisms of response to the dominant values of postwar United States, ( Hillstrom and Hillstr...