DOCSLIB.ORG

The American Reaction to the Atomic Bomb: 1945-1946

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The American Reaction to the Atomic Bomb: 1945-1946 UWEC Atomic Reaction The American Reaction to the Atomic Bomb: 1945-1946 Blum, Philip James 3/5/2013 Copyright for this work is owned by the author. This digital version is published by McIntyre Library, University of Wisconsin Eau Claire with the consent of the author. Table of Contents Abstract ......................................................................................................................................................... i Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. 1 The Dawning of a New Era ................................................................................................................... 3 Moral Capacity……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………4 American Public Opinion in the Immediate Aftermath .............................................................................. 5 Religious Response ................................................................................................................................... 6 Racial Perspectives……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………13 World Government? .......................................................................................................................... 16 Government Transgressions……………………………………….............................................................................18 The Military is No Democracy…………………………………………………………………………………….………….…………22 Racial Perspectives…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….23 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………28 Abstract This event bound Americans together in their experience of it because it was a unique event in human history. American’s reacted to the atomic bombing with a range of emotions; some were convinced of man’s irresponsibility. They deplored its use and protested the existence of something with so great an indiscriminate killing power. Others were more optimistic, sure that man’s rational nature assured an end to war, and that the future technical improvement of nuclear energy would lead to an abandonment of coal, oil, and falling water. Among these diverse concerns and remonstrations raised is the United States government influencing the way the story was reported in the media through censorship, journalistic preference, and wide propaganda powers. Enforced via the Espionage Act, an enormous amount of information related to the atomic bombing as well as the effects of radiation was withheld or otherwise partially explicated. i Introduction The American people woke up in cities all across America on August 7th, 1945 and read in their newspapers and were read on the radio a statement by President Harry Truman. Time Magazine summarizes this presidential statement, “Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base. That bomb had more power than 20,000 tons of TNT. … It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe…. What has been done is the greatest achievement of organized science in history…”1 While nobody knew the exact future power of nuclear energy, it was recognized that the atomic bomb was arguably the most important scientific achievement since fire. Humanity’s destructive capability rocketed to frightening and unknown levels. “Now I am become death; the destroyer of worlds.” J. Robert Oppenheimer quoted the Bhagavad Gita2 when he uttered those immortal words at the conclusion of the Trinity Test on the Alamogordo Reservation in Los Alamos, New Mexico on July 16th, 1945.3 The Trinity Test was the culmination of over $2,000,000,000 in government expenditure and in effect ushered in the nuclear age. Virtually all Americans knew nothing about the Manhattan Project or the prospects of harnessing nuclear energy at the time of the bombing of Hiroshima on August 6th, 1945. After learning about the nuclear bomb, some people protested in print as well as radio with soaring rhetoric, and abhorrence at the state of mankind. Many others felt quiet approval, and even optimism, citing social, religious, racial, militaristic, industrial, and scientific reasoning. People wondered what it meant for the present state of humanity, as well as the 1 “Birth of an Era,” Time Magazine, August 13th, 1945 2 Bhagavad Vita. Chapter 11:32 3 “The Eternal Apprentice,” Time Magazine, November 8th, 1948 1 future. Many predicted the coming of the apocalypse; after all, man had not been able to cure himself of war yet, why now? Others still were confident that atomic weapons would end war once and for all. Regardless of where Americans lived, where they worshipped, or what color their skin was, their reactions were indirectly influenced by their government as it sought to build a favorable collective memory of the development of and decision to use the atomic bomb. The US government undertook great effort to shape and mold the reaction of the American people to the atomic bomb. To their credit, Americans everywhere reacted with great variety, but a manipulative dissemination of information silenced academic criticism of the decision until the mid 1960s and prevented most Americans from learning the full story. The war-weary American public heard a half truth about this weapon and relevant information was closely controlled by the government. This was done in pursuit of shaping the collective memory about the end of the war, and it what light American’s would remember it in. This process was facilitated through press releases, the censure of media, and control of classified information. Before unpacking America’s reaction to the Atomic Bomb, the lens in real time needs to be recreated while at the same time deconstructing the fog of war that permeated people’s minds. The period between the first atomic bombing on August 6th, 1945 and the surrender of Japan aboard the USS Missouri on September 2nd, 1945, contains several events that impacted American perceptions of the last stages of the war in the Pacific. Included among these are the Soviet invasion of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo, the dropping of the 2nd bomb on Nagasaki, and finally the surrender. It is important to understand the war-time backdrop because these events heavily influenced decision making in the government and how people perceived the decisions. 2 Previous scholarship surrounding the atomic bomb is abound, but the real scholarly discussion began in 1965 with Gar Alperovitz’s, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb” which was the same title used by Secretary of war Henry Stimson in his defense of the decision. Alperovitz criticized the Truman administration for inadvertently starting the Cold War by dropping the bomb. The argument is twofold in that it frightened the Soviet Union into occupying Eastern Europe as a security guarantee, and it also shut the communists out of post- war Japan. He coins the term nuclear diplomacy and his work largely frames the debate on the atomic decision. Paul Boyer is another significant scholar in my question. Chapter 10 from, By the Bomb's Early Light: American Thought and Culture at the Dawn of the Atomic Age is where most of the evidence for government misuse of power is found.4 Boyer recounts instances of government control of information which didn’t allow for much information to be released. Wartime propaganda controls of the press through enforcement of the Espionage Act forbid the publishing of individual stories of suffering Japanese. Numbers of civilian casualties were edited out and only ‘military targets’ were reported in numbers destroyed. The gruesome reality of the atomic bomb was censured in all US media, with only photos of the mushroom clouds or the destruction printed. There were no pictures of the dead bodies, or the burn victims, or the radiation victims. The Dawning of a New Era What Americans learned when they opened their newspapers and turned on their radios on that fateful summer morning was that this atomic bomb signified a new time. It was such 4 Boyer, S. Paul. “By the Bomb's Early Light: American Thought and Culture at the Dawn of the Atomic Age” (NY: Pantheon, 1985; 2nd edn. with a new introduction, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994) 3 sensational news that by August 8th, two days after the bombing, already 97% of Americans had heard about it5, and naturally everybody had an opinion. The American people reacted to atomic bombings of the Empire of Japan in a multitude of ways. The foremost of these was the recognition of a new time. It was deemed the “Birth of an Era” 6 by Time Magazine, and around the nation and the world it was evident that today, was different than yesterday. It was the kind of event that typifies a global watershed moment; it was perceived universally as the final triumph of man over nature. Science had willed civilization to a place where the destructive capabilities of man far outweighed the level of moral maturity that he possessed. The Negro Star, out of Wichita, Kansas reaffirmed the feeling of different and new eras, it states, “The Atomic Bomb that prefaced the final outcome marked the end not only of a war but of an era.”7 The truth of these statements couldn’t ring truer, as 1945 marked the beginning of a different kind of war, the Cold War. This sentiment is echoed by others in New York Times as one of the many columns headlined, “New Age Ushered”8, with another exclaiming that humanity had reached “the age of atomic energy,”9. Eminent French Physicist Duc de Groglie
Load more

Recommended publications
  • How North Carolina's Black Politicians and Press Narrated and Influenced the Tu
    D. SHARPLEY 1 /133 Black Discourses in North Carolina, 1890-1902: How North Carolina’s Black Politicians and Press Narrated and Influenced the Tumultuous Era of Fusion Politics By Dannette Sharpley A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for Honors Department of History, Duke University Under the advisement of Dr. Nancy MacLean April 13, 2018 D. SHARPLEY 2 /133 Acknowledgements I am very grateful to have had the opportunity to write an Honors Thesis in the History Department. When I returned to school after many years of separation, I was prepared for challenging work. I expected to be pushed intellectually and emotionally. I expected to struggle through all-nighters, moments of self-doubt, and even academic setbacks. I did not, however, imagine that I could feel so passionate or excited about what I learned in class. I didn’t expect to even undertake such a large project, let alone arrive at the finish line. And I didn’t imagine the sense of accomplishment at having completed something that I feel is meaningful beyond my own individual education. The process of writing this thesis has been all those things and more. I would first like to thank everyone at the History Department who supports this Honors Distinction program, because this amazing process would not be possible without your work. Thank you very much to Dr. Nancy MacLean for advising me on this project. It was in Professor MacLean’s History of Modern Social Movements class that I became obsessed with North Carolina’s role in the Populist movement of the nineteenth, thus beginning this journey.
    [Show full text]
  • African Americans at the College of William and Mary from 1950 to 1970
    African Americans at the College of William and Mary from 1950 to 1970 By: Jacqueline Filzen 1 Introduction This paper investigates the admission policies and the experiences of the first African American students at the College of William and Mary between 1950 and 1970—the height of the civil rights era. During these tense times in American history African American emerged as leaders of social change by enrolling in institutions of higher learning such as William and Mary. In addition to exploring the experience of the first African Americans, this paper also explores the attitudes of students, faculty, and William and Mary’s administration to integration. African Americans graduated from American colleges as early as the 1820s. The first African Americans to receive a college degree included John Rosswumm, Edward Jones, and Lucius Twilight.1 These men went on to becoming successful newspaper editors, businessmen, and local politicians. Other African Americans joined their ranks and received college degrees between 1820 and 1900. “W.E.B. Dubois reported that 390 blacks had earned diplomas from white colleges and universities between 1865 and 1900”.2 Like “many of the nation’s most prestigious, predominantly white universities in the South—which did not admit any blacks until the 1950s or 1960s”3 the College of William and Mary did not admit an African American student until 1951. Its decision to admit an African American student was not due to the school’s support for integration. Rather this decision was taken to avoid any legal repercussions if the College had done otherwise. Furthermore the College only admitted its first African American student after much deliberation and consultation with the Board of Visitors and the Attorney General.
    [Show full text]
  • Chance to Meet at Summit Delivery Lapel
    ■/. •’ ■ MONDAY, MARCH 1«, WB9 .Avcnce^Baily Net Press Run ’ The Weather rorodtet of 0. 8- Wasther ■areps Pikcni POtJRTBSN fljanrljpotpf lEuftitn^ the Week RNdiag March 14th, lt59. Increasing cinudtiHiss this 'eve- ■nj# Army and Natv Auxiliary! GENERAL - nlng, cloudy^ and'epM tonight. Low The Newcoawa Cluh..wUl meet Ramp Estimate, 12,895 In tIHi. Wedneaday Y »lr and Mid. tomorrow night , at • d'diock at will hold a public card party to -; ^ v About Town the Community T.- Memhei^. are night at 8 o’clock at the clubhouae ^ -f. Mesnbar of the Audit High In 8ds. Bolton St. Plan TV SERVICE iSureau of Ormlatton. reminded .to bring haU fo r the Dftya e O QK A OaO lManche$ter— A City of Village craty hat conioat; John Mather Chapter, Order of Mr». It « « ti* P«lme, p rtiM trA DeMoly. will hold a buatnesa meet- Not Completed Nights O iM a Pint Parte ot IUvle«‘. Women'* Bene­ Mancheater liodge of Maeons •mg tonight at 7 o’clock In the Ma- TEL. Ml a-54«3 (Ulaaained Adiecfislng on Pago 14) J^PRICE FIVE CENTS fit A m - t •«<> Irene Vinwk. abnlc Terrtple. A rehearsal of the No new development* are ex­ VOL. LXXVIII, NO. 141 (SIXTEEN PAGES) MANCHESTER. CONN., Tl^SD AY, MA^ffH 17, i#59 ndll hold a special meeting to- pected to come up'on the subjects j are coSielrmen of » committee laotTow night at 7:30 at the Ma­ Injtiitory degree will follow- the amnstna: for e pubttc c«wJ p«rty of Bolton St. floodiag end a pro-1 sonic Temple.
    [Show full text]
  • National Register of Historic Places Multiple Property Documentation Form
    NPS Form 10-900-b (Rev. 01/2009) OMB No. 1024-0018 (Expires 5/31/2012) United States Department of the Interior NPS Approved National Park Service 6-28-2011 National Register of Historic Places Multiple Property Documentation Form This form is used for documenting property groups relating to one or several historic contexts. See instructions in National Register Bulletin How to Complete the Multiple Property Documentation Form (formerly 16B). Complete each item by entering the requested information. For additional space, use continuation sheets (Form 10-900-a). Use a typewriter, word processor, or computer to complete all items x New Submission Amended Submission A. Name of Multiple Property Listing African American Resources in Wichita, Sedgwick County, Kansas B. Associated Historic Contexts (Name each associated historic context, identifying theme, geographical area, and chronological period for each.) I. Development of Wichita’s African American Community: 1870-1971 II. African American Elementary and Secondary Education in Wichita: 1870-1971 III. Civil Rights in Wichita: 1947-1972 C. Form Prepared by name/title Deon Wolfenbarger organization Three Gables Preservation date December 2010 street & number 320 Pine Glade Road telephone 303-258-3136 city or town Nederland state CO zip code 80466 e-mail D. Certification As the designated authority under the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, as amended, I hereby certify that this documentation form meets the National Register documentation standards and sets forth requirements for the listing of related properties consistent with the National Register criteria. This submission meets the procedural and professional requirements set forth in 36 CFR 60 and the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards and Guidelines for Archeology and Historic Preservation.
    [Show full text]
  • Draft Dissertation
    Dissention in the Ranks—Dissent Within U.S. Civil-Military Relations During the Truman Administration: A Historical Approach by David A. “DAM” Martin B.A. in History, May 1989, Virginia Military Institute M.A. in Military Studies—Land Warfare, June 2002, American Military University M.B.A., June 2014, Strayer University A Dissertation submitted to The Faculty of The Graduate School of Education and Human Development of The George Washington University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education January 19, 2018 Dissertation directed by Andrea J. Casey Associate Professor of Human and Organizational Learning The Graduate School of Education and Human Development of the George Washington University certifies that David A. “DAM” Martin has passed the final examination for the degree of Doctor of Education as of September 22, 2017. This is the final and approved form of the dissertation. Dissention in the Ranks—Dissent Within U.S. Civil-Military Relations During the Truman Administration: A Historical Approach David A. “DAM” Martin Dissertation Research Committee: Andrea J. Casey, Associate Professor of Human and Organizational Learning, Dissertation Director David R. Schwandt, Professor Emeritus of Human and Organizational Learning, Committee Member Stamatina McGrath, Adjunct Instructor, Department of History, George Mason University, Committee Member ii © Copyright 2018 by David A. Martin All rights reserved iii Dedication Dedicated to those who have Served honorably, Dissented when the cause was just, and paid dearly for it. iv Acknowledgments I want to thank my dissertation chair, Dr. Andrea Casey, for her outstanding advice and counsel throughout this educative journey. Thank you to my dissertation committee member, Dr.
    [Show full text]
  • Michigan State University Cynthia Rose Goldstein
    w ' “W”M”~~~w :2 THE PRESS COVERAGE-OF THE _ . e ENTRANCE 0F JACKIE ROBIN-SON ' ~ INTO BASEBALL AS THE Fl-‘RSTBLACK . i .15: if; . Thesis for the Degree of M. A.- § - MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY CYNTHIA ROSE GOLDSTEIN . ._ 1973‘ . I .‘ d“ T, I ' . a o c < . ‘ v v ~T . ' . ' . _ .3. _ _ " C. ,' O . .‘4- ‘_ ', .I. __ .. ,v ' ' . - .' {.- ,‘. ..-.' ...'_- ‘ . - '. J _ . ’ '1: :. 4:0- . ~ _H. ,1 ' — ' ' K ‘ ' - - " .I» ' ' - .-- , . ..-,.‘ - 4' ~ .. 7:“-‘t- -'~* - vra O; ‘ - ------ y-*_-.1’-v. l 1.. ‘ ’ .’ o - -,‘ . , . y..' ' . c .0 ‘ ' . ‘ . - ' . '. z. ’ , v'r'-'o‘. g-‘u'd‘ "'o “v. '3'.{.:.'.._ . ' - .. '7 . ... g . ' 9 'c- . , 0 ';-."C v.1 1' ' '05.; . ,. -- . ,r. ‘:'.:. ‘- 1 'n - ¢;. -o'."q' .“)‘.'.J‘:‘.;:'. ’J:11“.'J._":f; :n\ '.".1- LGfo:n¢n‘-' " \I’v:‘::-< {:1’-"ru1fM-:'l‘t‘-m I PLACE ll RETURfl BOX to roman this checkout from your "cord. \ TO AVOID FINES Wm on Of More dd. (10.. I DATE, DUE DATE DUE DATE our»: 3 I . ‘l * \ ~ APR 3309 T a v—fi—j H; : Pm 201 Two \\“ r usu Is An Nflmaflvo Action/Equal oppomnny Imuuuon WW9 ABSTRACT THE PRESS COVERAGE OF THE ENTRANCE OF JACKIE ROBINSON INTO BASEBALL AS THE FIRST BLACK BY Cynthia Rose Goldstein In 1945, a revolution began to take place in baseball. Branch Rickey, owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers, a team in the National League, signed Jackie Robinson, a player from the Kansas City Monarchs, a team in the Negro American League, to a contract with the Dodgers. This study examines the press coverage of the entrance of Jackie Robinson into baseball as the first black.
    [Show full text]
  • Black and Catholic Responses to the Second Ku Klux Klan
    Providence College DigitalCommons@Providence History & Classics Undergraduate Theses History & Classics Fall 2019 Unheard Voices Against the Invisible Empire: Black and Catholic Responses to the Second Ku Klux Klan William Hartl Providence College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.providence.edu/history_undergrad_theses Part of the History Commons Hartl, William, "Unheard Voices Against the Invisible Empire: Black and Catholic Responses to the Second Ku Klux Klan" (2019). History & Classics Undergraduate Theses. 39. https://digitalcommons.providence.edu/history_undergrad_theses/39 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the History & Classics at DigitalCommons@Providence. It has been accepted for inclusion in History & Classics Undergraduate Theses by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Providence. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Unheard Voices Against the Invisible Empire: Black and Catholic Responses to the Second Ku Klux Klan by William Hartl HIS 490 History Honors Thesis Department of History Providence College Fall 2019 This paper is dedicated to all the victims of the Ku Klux Klan and to all those courageous individuals who risked their lives in order to bring to light the evils of the Invisible Empire. “The condition of truth is to allow suffering to speak” - Dr. Cornel West CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.………………………………………………………….…...…….….v INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………...1 CHAPTER 1. THE IDEOLOGY OF THE SECOND KLAN…………………………………….10 The Klan’s Worldview………………………………………………………………...…11
    [Show full text]
  • Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas
    Fort Hays State University FHSU Scholars Repository Monographs Forsyth Library 2021 Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas Mark E. Eberle Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs Part of the History Commons Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas Mark E. Eberle Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas. © 2021 by Mark E. Eberle Cover image: Andy Cooper and Oscar Charleston at the 1938 East-West All-Star Game. Courtesy of Larry Lester, NoirTech Research, Inc. Recommended citation: Eberle, Mark E. 2021. Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas. Fort Hays State University, Hays, Kansas. 8 pages. Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas Mark E. Eberle Wichita, Kansas. June 1928. Anticipation among baseball fans was growing as the Wichita Eagle promoted a visit by the Kansas City Monarchs, who were to play a pair of games with a local team. Much of the newspaper’s promotion centered on the return of a local player and two others who had previously played for Wichita teams. All three were now members of the famed Monarchs.1 The local player was Thomas Jefferson “T.J.” Young, who sometimes went by the nickname “T Baby.” Born in Alabama, Young was primarily a catcher who first played in Wichita for the Black Wonders in 1922. Later that spring, the team was purchased by the Monrovia Amusement Park Corporation, which had its own ballpark at the intersection of 12th and Mosley Streets (between Mosely and Meade). The Monrovians joined the Colored Western League when it reorganized later that summer and claimed the pennant in the league’s only season.
    [Show full text]
  • I'll See You in Church” Local Films in African American Communities
    3 “I’ll See You in Church” Local Films in African American Communities, 1924–1962 MARTIN L. JOHNSON Pictures aren’t made in a straight line. We take a little bit of this and a little of that and then it’s all looked at and selected and made into a whole. You mean you piece it together? That’s the idea, I said. Well tell me something! she said. Isn ’t that just marvelous? Just like making a scrap quilt, I guess; one of th ose with all the colors of the rainbow in it—on ly more compli- cated. Is that it? Just about, I said. There has to be a pattern though and we only have black and white. Well, she said, th ere’s Indians and some of the black is almost white and brown like me.— ralph ellison, Three Days Before the Shooting As the history of cinema in the United States becomes unmoored from the history of Hollywood, familiar lands become foreign countries. From new vantage points, events that were once considered to be minor or inconse- quential, such as the showing of movies outside of theaters, are now cause for rethinking how cinema was experienced in the twentieth cent ury. As small- gauge and orphan films resurface, our view of cinema history swish- pans from the few dozen movies produced in Los Angeles and New York every season to the tens of thousands, and at times hundreds of thousands, of motion pictures made every year by amateurs and professionals in the middle de cades of the twentieth century.
    [Show full text]
  • A Study of the Attitudes That African Americans Held Regarding the Japanese During World War II
    The University of Southern Mississippi The Aquila Digital Community Honors Theses Honors College 5-2020 Suspicious Minds: A Study of the Attitudes that African Americans held regarding the Japanese During World War II Timothy E. Buchanan Follow this and additional works at: https://aquila.usm.edu/honors_theses Part of the History Commons Recommended Citation Buchanan, Timothy E., "Suspicious Minds: A Study of the Attitudes that African Americans held regarding the Japanese During World War II" (2020). Honors Theses. 752. https://aquila.usm.edu/honors_theses/752 This Honors College Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Honors College at The Aquila Digital Community. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of The Aquila Digital Community. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The University of Southern Mississippi Suspicious Minds: A Study of the Attitudes that African Americans held regarding the Japanese During World War II By Timothy E. Buchanan A Thesis Submitted to the Honors College of The University of Southern Mississippi in Partial Fulfillment of Honors Requirements May 2020 i ii Approved by; ________________________ Kevin Greene, Ph.D., Thesis Advisor Assistant Professor of History ________________________ Matthew Casey, Ph.D., Director School of Humanities ________________________ Ellen Weinauer, Ph.D., Dean Honors College iii Abstract This thesis explores African American viewpoints about the Japanese, from just before the bombing of Pearl Harbor up to Allied occupation of Japan after the Second World War. The primary sources for this thesis include Black newspapers, the papers of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), as well as oral histories from African American veterans.
    [Show full text]
  • Eisenhower, Stevenson and the African-American Vote in the 1956 Election Lincoln M
    Student Publications Student Scholarship Spring 2014 Throwing the Switch: Eisenhower, Stevenson and the African-American Vote in the 1956 Election Lincoln M. Fitch Gettysburg College Follow this and additional works at: https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/student_scholarship Part of the African American Studies Commons, American Politics Commons, Political History Commons, Race and Ethnicity Commons, and the United States History Commons Share feedback about the accessibility of this item. Fitch, Lincoln M., "Throwing the Switch: Eisenhower, Stevenson and the African-American Vote in the 1956 Election" (2014). Student Publications. 219. https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/student_scholarship/219 This is the author's version of the work. This publication appears in Gettysburg College's institutional repository by permission of the copyright owner for personal use, not for redistribution. Cupola permanent link: https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/student_scholarship/ 219 This open access student research paper is brought to you by The uC pola: Scholarship at Gettysburg College. It has been accepted for inclusion by an authorized administrator of The uC pola. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Throwing the Switch: Eisenhower, Stevenson and the African-American Vote in the 1956 Election Abstract This paper seeks to contextualize the 1956 election by providing a summary of the African American political alignment during the preceding half-century. Winning a greater portion of the black vote was a central tenant of the 1956 Eisenhower Campaign strategy. In the 1956 election a substantial shift occurred among the historically democratic black electorate. The otv e shifted because of disillusionment with the Democrats and Eisenhower’s civil rights record. The swing however, was less pronounced for Republican congressional candidates.
    [Show full text]
  • Black on Both Sides
    BLACK ON BOTH SIDES Snorton.indd 1 29/09/2017 8:40:54 AM Also by C. Riley Snorton Nobody Is Supposed to Know: Black Sexuality on the Down Low Snorton.indd 2 29/09/2017 8:40:55 AM BLACK A Racial History of ON BOTH Trans Identity SIDES C. RILEY SNORTON University of Minnesota Press | Minneapolis | London Snorton.indd 3 29/09/2017 8:40:55 AM Every effort was made to obtain permission to reproduce material in this book. If any proper acknowledgment has not been included here, we encourage copyright holders to notify the publisher. Lyrics in chapter 5 were previously published as “The Father, Son, and Unholy Ghosts,” in Essex Hemphill, Tongues Untied: Poems by Dirg Aaab- Richards, Craig G. Harris, Essex Hemphill, Isaac Jackson, Assotto Sainte (London: GMP, 1987). Reprinted with permission of the Frances Goldin Literary Agency, Inc. Copyright 2017 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechan- ical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Published by the University of Minnesota Press 111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290 Minneapolis, MN 55401- 2520 http://www.upress.umn.edu ISBN 978-1-5179-0172-1 (hc) ISBN 978-1-5179-0173-8 (pb) A Cataloging-in-Publication record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. Printed in the United States of America on acid- free paper The University of Minnesota is an equal- opportunity educator and employer.
    [Show full text]