DOCSLIB.ORG

Constitutional Culture, Social Movement Conflict and Constitutional Change: the Case of the De Facto ERA

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Constitutional Culture, Social Movement Conflict and Constitutional Change: the Case of the De Facto ERA Constitutional Culture, Social Movement Conflict and Constitutional Change: The Case of the de facto ERA 2005-06 Brennan Center Symposium Lecture Reva B. Siegel" INTRODUCTION Social movements change the ways Americans understand the Constitution. Social movement conflict, enabled and constrained by consti- tutional culture, can create new forms of constitutional understanding-a dynamic that guides officials interpreting the open-textured language of the Constitution's rights guarantees. To show how constitutional culture chan- nels social movement conflict to produce enforceable constitutional under- standings, I consider how equal protection doctrine prohibiting sex discrimination was forged in the Equal Rights Amendment's defeat. Copyright 0 2006 California Law Review, Inc. California Law Review, Inc. (CLR) is a California nonprofit corporation. CLR and the authors are solely responsible for the content of their publications. f Nicholas deB. Katzenbach Professor of Law and Professor of American Studies. It was a great joy to give this lecture first at Boalt Hall, where I started teaching, and then at Yale, where I stud- ied and now teach, in a classroom filled with my friends, teachers, students, and family, including my brother Fred, who brought my sister Laura, mother Eve, and his wife Jane and son Yale, to hear me speak. The occasion was shining and whole, and continues to light this lecture, even as his great strug- gle for life marked its writing. I am grateful to my friends Bruce Ackerman, Larry Kramer, Martha Minow, and Robin West for their comments on this lecture-a rich moment in a long-running conver- sation from which I am always learning-as well as to Robert Post and Jack Balkin, with whom I write on these questions. I was also fortunate to discuss the manuscript with Jorge Contesse, Barry Friedman, Michael Graetz, Ariel Lavinbuk, Ron Levy, Jane Mansbridge, Judith Resnik, and Steve Teles, as well as participants in workshops at Harvard, N.Y.U., University of Pennsylvania, and University of Toronto law schools. I owe thanks to Caitlin Casey, Ron Levy, David Tannenbaum, and especially Nels Ylitalo for research assistance. Finally, I would like to thank the students of the California Law Review for their hard work in publishing this piece, and their kind understanding. 1323 HeinOnline -- 94 Cal. L. Rev. 1323 2006 1324 CALIFORNIA LA W REVIEW [Vol. 94:1323 For the first century of the Fourteenth Amendment's life, no court interpreted the Constitution to prohibit state action favoring men over women.' In the 1970s, a mobilized feminist movement persuaded Congress to send an Equal Rights Amendment to the states for ratification. With en- ergetic countermobilization, the ERA was defeated. In this same period, the Court began to interpret the Fourteenth Amendment in ways that were responsive to the amendment's proponents-so much so that scholars have begun to refer to the resulting body of equal protection case law as a "de facto ERA."2 When President Reagan proposed a nominee to the Supreme Court who argued that the original understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment allowed government to discriminate between the sexes, the Senate rejected his nomination. Instead of viewing Fourteenth Amendment cases influenced by the ERA as an antidemocratic usurpation, the public viewed the authority of a nominee who questioned the sex discrimination case law as suspect.' Debate over whether to amend the Constitution changed the meaning of the Constitution-in the process forging modern understandings of discrimination "on account of sex."4 The ERA was not ratified, but the amendment's proposal and defeat played a crucial role in enabling and shaping the modern law of sex dis- crimination. Yet constitutional law lacks tools to explain constitutional change of this kind. No act of lawmaking produced the sex discrimination cases; and if the cases can be justified as legitimate judicial interpretations of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century constitutional text, it is only by re- pressing their roots in popular mobilization for and against an Article V amendment. Citizens regularly seek constitutional change through the ar- duous lawmaking procedures of Article V as well as outside of them, and officials charged with enforcing the Constitution often act in response to their claims; yet when these interactions do not conform to paradigms of lawmaking or adjudication, constitutional law discounts their role in con- stitutional change. In this Lecture, I resist the dichotomy between lawmaking and inter- pretation, and focus instead on the field of constitutional culture to explore the formal and informal interactions between citizens5 and officials that guide constitutional change. Such interactions include but are not limited to lawmaking and adjudication; confirmation hearings, ordinary legislation, failed amendments, campaigns for elective office, and protest marches all I. See infra note 39. 2. See infra text accompanying notes 23-32. 3. See infra text accompanying notes 272-277. 4. Cf Reva B. Siegel, Equality Talk: Antisubordination and Anticlassification Values in Constitutional Struggles Over Brown, 117 HARV. L. REv. 1470 (2004) (reconstructing how social movement conflict shaped modem understandings of discrimination "on account of race"). 5. 1 use the term "citizen" to refer to persons living in a community governed by a constitution who are not government officials. HeinOnline -- 94 Cal. L. Rev. 1324 2006 20061 CONSTITUTIONAL CULTURE 1325 may provide occasion for citizen deliberation and mobilization and for of- ficial action in response to constitutional claims. The Lecture employs the term "constitutional culture" to refer to the understandings of role and practices of argument that guide interactions among citizens and officials in matters concerning the Constitution's meaning. 6 The Lecture does not use the concept of constitutional culture as some in constitutional theory employ it: as social values relevant to matters of constitutional law that an official engaged in responsive interpretation in- corporates into the fabric of constitutional law. Rather than focus on offi- cials as change-agents, I employ the concept of constitutional culture to explore how changes in constitutional understanding emerge from the in- teraction of citizens and officials. In this usage, constitutional culture shapes both popular and professional claims about the Constitution and enables the forms of communication and deliberative engagement among citizens and officials that dynamically sustain the Constitution's democ- ratic authority in history.7 The Lecture analyzes constitutional culture as a field in which citizens and officials interact; some interactions are formalized, like the procedures 6. In analyzing the way the Constitution's meaning arises out of interactions among members of the polity and between members of the polity and government officials, this account of constitutional culture is indebted to Robert Cover's account of jurisgenesis. Robert Cover first used the term "jurisgenesis" in Nomos and Narrative to describe the way that legal meaning is created in the normative universe, or "nomos," of the polity; Cover emphasized that jurisgenesis did not require formal lawmaking. See Robert M. Cover, The Supreme Court, 1982 Term-Foreword:Nomos and Narrative, 97 HARV. L. REV. 4, 11-19 (1982) ("[T]he creation of legal meaning-'jurisgenesis'-takes place always through an essentially cultural medium. Although the state is not necessarily the creator of legal meaning, the creative process is collective or social.") (footnote omitted). As Martha Minow describes Cover's vision: Cover placed at the center of law the communal groups that would seem peripheral if the government's own world view were the starting point. In so doing, Cover set in motion three captivating arguments: (1) government should be understood as one among many contestants for generating and implementing norms; (2) communities ignored or despised by those running the state actually craft and sustain norms with at least as much effect and worth as those espoused by the state;and (3) imposition of the state's norms does violence to communities, a violence that may be justifiable but is not to be preferred a priori. NARRATIVE, VIOLENCE, AND THE LAW: THE ESSAYS OF ROBERT COVER 2 (Martha Minow et al. eds., 1992). Cover's work has proven enormously influential among legal scholars of popular constitutionalism. See Larry D. Kramer, PopularConstitutionalism, circa 2004, 92 CALIF. L. REV. 959, 975 (2004). Jim Pope first employed the concept ofjurisgenesis to describe the way social movements forge constitutional understandings. See James Gray Pope, Labor's Constitution Of Freedom, 106 YALE L.J. 941, 954 (1997) ("Robert Cover's concept of jurisgenesis, the creation of legal meaning, provides the foundation for a theory about the role of legal thought and practice in sustaining resistance, and thus for an ideal type of constitutional insurgency that proceeds from localities to the center."); Reva B. Siegel, Text in Contest: Gender and the Constitution from a Social Movement Perspective, 150 U. PA. L. REV. 297 (2001) (contrasting a judge-centered, "Constitution-as-common- law" account of the rise of sex discrimination law with an account that includes the jurisgenerative efforts of the women's movement). 7. Siegel, supra note 6, at 320 ("While the authority of the Constitution is sustained in part through practices of veneration and deference, it is also sustained through a very different
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Nineteenth Amendment, Sex Equality, Federalism, and the Family
    VOLUME 115 FEBRUARY 2002 NUMBER 4 HARVARD LAW REVIEW ARTICLE SHE THE PEOPLE: THE NINETEENTH AMENDMENT, SEX EQUALITY, FEDERALISM, AND THE FAMILY Reva B. Siegel TABLE OF CONTENTS IN TRO D UCTIO N ............................................................................................................................... 948 I. THE SEX DISCRIMINATION PARADIGM ............................................................................... 953 II. TOWARD A SYNTHETIC READING OF THE FOURTEENTH AND NINETEENTH AMEND- MENTS: A NEW HISTORICAL FOUNDATION FOR SEX DISCRIMINATION DOCTRINE ....... 96o A. Frontiero's Use of History in Building the Race Analogy ................................................ 961 B. Analogical and Synthetic Interpretation:A New Role for History in Sex Discrim inationD octrine..................................................................................................... 965 C. HistoricalTies Between the Fourteenth and Nineteenth Amendments ......................... 968 D. Reading the Suffrage Debates: Some PreliminaryRemarks ........................................... 976 III. VOTING AND THE FAM ILY ...................................................................................................... 977 A. Virtual Representation:Male Household Headship in Public and Private Law .......... 981 B. "Self-Government": The Woman Suffrage Rejoinder....................................................... 987 C. The Surrejoinder:Marital Unity Arguments Against Woman Suffrage ......................... 993 IV. OF FAMILIES,
    [Show full text]
  • From Hostess to Political Surrogate: the Evolving Role of the First Lady of the United States
    Cultural and Religious Studies, ISSN 2328-2177 March 2014, Vol. 2, No. 3, 181-193 D DAVID PUBLISHING From Hostess to Political Surrogate: The Evolving Role of the First Lady of the United States Allison R. Levin, Esq Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, USA This paper investigates the evolution of the role of the first lady of the United States, which is of particular interest because of its non-constitutional and non-formal nature that has become one of the most prominent and visible non-paid positions in the world. The first lady’s responsibility has evolved from serving as a social hostess and a ceremonial presence at the side of the President, to serving as a spokeswoman for the country. More recently, in addition to her other duties, the first lady has acted as a political surrogate for the President. This study conducts a social movement rhetorical analysis, using the technique of discourse tracing, to examine how and why the culture of the office of the first lady has evolved. Finally, this study will add current political culture scholarship by investigating issues surrounding the 2016 presidential election. Keywords: politics, first Ladies, organizational culture, elections Introduction Prior to 1933 and the election of Franklin Roosevelt, the first lady was a non-essential member of the White House. The spouse of the President did not even have an official name or position for many years. These women were expected to fill traditional wifely roles including supporting their husbands, hosting parties, and being ready to make the President look good to the public.
    [Show full text]
  • American Bolsheviki: the Beginnings of the First Red Scare, 1917 to 1918
    Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal Volume 3 Issue 2 Article 4 2019 American Bolsheviki: The Beginnings of the First Red Scare, 1917 to 1918 Jonathan Dunning Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.murraystate.edu/steeplechase Part of the European History Commons, Other History Commons, Political History Commons, and the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Dunning, Jonathan (2019) "American Bolsheviki: The Beginnings of the First Red Scare, 1917 to 1918," Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal: Vol. 3 : Iss. 2 , Article 4. Available at: https://digitalcommons.murraystate.edu/steeplechase/vol3/iss2/4 This Feature is brought to you for free and open access by the The Office of Research and Creative Activity at Murray State's Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal by an authorized editor of Murray State's Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. American Bolsheviki: The Beginnings of the First Red Scare, 1917 to 1918 Abstract A consensus has developed among historians that widespread panic consumed the American public and government as many came to fear a Bolshevik coup of the United States government and the undermining of the American way of life beginning in early 1919. Known as the First Red Scare, this period became one of the most well-known episodes of American fear of Communism in US history. With this focus on the events of 1919 to 1920, however, historians of the First Red Scare have often ignored the initial American reaction to the October Revolution in late 1917 and throughout 1918.
    [Show full text]
  • When Fear Is Substituted for Reason: European and Western Government Policies Regarding National Security 1789-1919
    WHEN FEAR IS SUBSTITUTED FOR REASON: EUROPEAN AND WESTERN GOVERNMENT POLICIES REGARDING NATIONAL SECURITY 1789-1919 Norma Lisa Flores A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY December 2012 Committee: Dr. Beth Griech-Polelle, Advisor Dr. Mark Simon Graduate Faculty Representative Dr. Michael Brooks Dr. Geoff Howes Dr. Michael Jakobson © 2012 Norma Lisa Flores All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT Dr. Beth Griech-Polelle, Advisor Although the twentieth century is perceived as the era of international wars and revolutions, the basis of these proceedings are actually rooted in the events of the nineteenth century. When anything that challenged the authority of the state – concepts based on enlightenment, immigration, or socialism – were deemed to be a threat to the status quo and immediately eliminated by way of legal restrictions. Once the façade of the Old World was completely severed following the Great War, nations in Europe and throughout the West started to revive various nineteenth century laws in an attempt to suppress the outbreak of radicalism that preceded the 1919 revolutions. What this dissertation offers is an extended understanding of how nineteenth century government policies toward radicalism fostered an environment of increased national security during Germany’s 1919 Spartacist Uprising and the 1919/1920 Palmer Raids in the United States. Using the French Revolution as a starting point, this study allows the reader the opportunity to put events like the 1848 revolutions, the rise of the First and Second Internationals, political fallouts, nineteenth century imperialism, nativism, Social Darwinism, and movements for self-government into a broader historical context.
    [Show full text]
  • Performative Citizenship in the Civil Rights and Immigrant Rights Movements
    Performative Citizenship in the Civil Rights and Immigrant Rights Movements Kathryn Abrams In August 2013, Maria Teresa Kumar, the executive director of Voto Lat mo, spoke aJongside civil rights leaders at the fiftieth anniversary of the March on Washington. A month earlier, immigrant activists invited the Reverend Al Sharpton to join a press conference outside the federal court building as they celebrated a legal victory over joe Arpaio, the anti-immigrant sheriff of Maricopa County. Undocumented youth orga­ nizing for immigration reform explained their persistence with Marlin Luther King's statement that "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towardjustice." 1 The civil rights movement remains a potent reminder that politically marginalized groups can shape the Jaw through mobilization and col­ lective action. This has made the movement a crucial source of sym­ bolism for those activists who have come after. But it has also been a source of what sociologist Doug McAdam has called "cultural innova­ uons"2: transformative strategies and tactics that can be embraced and modified by later movements. This chapter examines the legacy of the Civil Rights Act by revisiting the social movement that produced it and comparing that movement to a recent and galvanizing successor, the movement for immigrant rights.3 This movement has not simply used the storied tactics of the civil rights movement; it has modified them 2 A Nation of Widening Opportunities in ways that render them more performative: undocumented activists implement the familiar tactics that enact, in daring and surprising ways, the public belonging to which they aspire.4 This performative dimen­ sion would seem to distinguish the immigrant rights movement, at the level of organizational strategy, from its civil rights counterpart, whose participants were constitutionally acknowledged as citizens.
    [Show full text]
  • Constitutional Amendments That Never Were
    Constitutional Amendments That Never Were By Jon Bradley King However, certain proposals have received the The minute globe we inhabit has been partitioned by requisite two-thirds vote of both the House and Senate, the forces of language, religion and war into almost 170 yet have failed to win the necessary three-fourths of the ?atio?-states. These sovereign entities, varying widely states to their cause. This article will discuss these In Size, strength and political system share one ill-fated measures: the constitutional amendments that common characteristic: each has a body of laws and never were. customs reflecting the collective perception of its When the Founding Fathers brought forth their citizenry regarding the proper attributes of their work to the waiting world, the result was viewed by government, in short, a "constitution." In some states, some with alarm. Richard Henry Lee of Virginia, such as Great Britain and Saudi Arabia, the proclaiming that a "coalition of monarchy men . fundamental law is not contained in a single written aristocrats and drones" had authored the document, text. In other nations, China for example, the proposed a Bill of Rights as "necessary against the constitution is a veritable laundry list specifying in encroachments of power upon the indispen~able rights wearisome detail precisely what the state is of human nature." Several states ratified the proposed empowered to do. While some countries revere their constitutions and view alterations of the basic law with Constitution only upon the condition that amendments great hesitancy, other states, such as strife-torn Bolivia, be adopted to guarantee the rights of states and the have seen one military strongman after another people in the new federal government.
    [Show full text]
  • Hearing on the Equal Rights Amendment
    Written Statement of Elizabeth Price Foley Professor of Law Florida International University College of Law Hearing on the Equal Rights Amendment Committee on the Judiciary U.S. House of Representatives April 30, 2019 Chairman Nadler, Ranking Member Collins, and members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss the procedures for ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment ("ERA"). I am a tenured, full Professor of Law at Florida International University College of Law, a public law school located in Miami, where I teach constitutional law. I also serve Of Counsel with the Washington, D.C. office of BakerHostetler, LLP, where I practice constitutional and appellate law. I. Background on Ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment An Equal Rights Amendment was first proposed in 1921 but did not receive approval of the requisite two-thirds supermajority of the House and Senate until March 22, 1972. The text of the proposed amendment reads as follows: Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex. Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article. Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.1 The Joint Resolution proposing the ERA contained a preamble limiting the allowed period of ratification to seven years: Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission by the Congress.2 The seven-year ratification period expired on March 22, 1979.
    [Show full text]
  • DOUG Mcadam CURRENT POSITION
    DOUG McADAM CURRENT POSITION: The Ray Lyman Wilbur Professor of Sociology (with affiliations in American Studies, Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity, and the Interdisciplinary Program in Environmental Research) Stanford University Stanford, CA 94305 PRIOR POSITIONS: Fall 2001 – Summer 2005 Director, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, CA Fall 1998 – Summer 2001 Professor, Department of Sociology, Stanford University Spring 1983 - Summer 1998 Assistant to Full Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Arizona Fall 1979 - Winter 1982 Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, George Mason University EDUCATION: 1973 Occidental College Los Angeles, California B.S., Sociology 1977 State University of New York at Stony Brook Stony Brook, New York M.A., Sociology 1979 State University of New York at Stony Brook Stony Brook, New York Ph.D., Sociology FELLOWSHIPS AND OTHER HONORS: Post Graduate Visiting Scholar, Russell Sage Foundation, 2013-14. DOUG McADAM Page 2 Granted 2013 “Award for Distinguished Scholar,” by University of Wisconsin, Whitewater, March 2013. Named the Ray Lyman Wilbur Professor of Sociology, 2013. Awarded the 2012 Joseph B. and Toby Gittler Prize, Brandeis University, November 2012 Invited to deliver the Gunnar Myrdal Lecture at Stockholm University, May 2012 Invited to deliver the 2010-11 “Williamson Lecture” at Lehigh University, October 2010. Named a Phi Beta Kappa Society Visiting Scholar for 2010-11. Named Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation for 2010-11. (Forced to turn down the invitation) Co-director of a 2010 Social Science Research Council pre-dissertation workshop on “Contentious Politics.” Awarded the 2010 Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service Research Prize, given annually to a scholar for their contributions to the study of “civic engagement.” Awarded the John D.
    [Show full text]
  • The 19Th Amendment
    National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Women Making History: The 19th Amendment Women The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. —19th Amendment to the United States Constitution In 1920, after decades of tireless activism by countless determined suffragists, American women were finally guaranteed the right to vote. The year 2020 marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment. It was ratified by the states on August 18, 1920 and certified as an amendment to the US Constitution on August 26, 1920. Developed in partnership with the National Park Service, this publication weaves together multiple stories about the quest for women’s suffrage across the country, including those who opposed it, the role of allies and other civil rights movements, who was left behind, and how the battle differed in communities across the United States. Explore the complex history and pivotal moments that led to ratification of the 19th Amendment as well as the places where that history happened and its continued impact today. 0-31857-0 Cover Barcode-Arial.pdf 1 2/17/20 1:58 PM $14.95 ISBN 978-1-68184-267-7 51495 9 781681 842677 The National Park Service is a bureau within the Department Front cover: League of Women Voters poster, 1920. of the Interior. It preserves unimpaired the natural and Back cover: Mary B. Talbert, ca. 1901. cultural resources and values of the National Park System for the enjoyment, education, and inspiration of this and All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this work future generations.
    [Show full text]
  • Thirteenth Amendment A
    University of Cincinnati College of Law University of Cincinnati College of Law Scholarship and Publications Faculty Articles and Other Publications College of Law Faculty Scholarship 2003 Stopping Time: The rP o-Slavery and 'Irrevocable' Thirteenth Amendment A. Christopher Bryant University of Cincinnati College of Law, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.uc.edu/fac_pubs Part of the Constitutional Law Commons, and the Legal History, Theory and Process Commons Recommended Citation Bryant, A. Christopher, "Stopping Time: The rP o-Slavery and 'Irrevocable' Thirteenth Amendment" (2003). Faculty Articles and Other Publications. Paper 63. http://scholarship.law.uc.edu/fac_pubs/63 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Law Faculty Scholarship at University of Cincinnati College of Law Scholarship and Publications. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Articles and Other Publications by an authorized administrator of University of Cincinnati College of Law Scholarship and Publications. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STOPPING TIME: THE PRO-SLAVERY AND "IRREVOCABLE" THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT • A. CHRISTOPHER BRYANT I. EXTRALEGAL AUTHORITY AND THE CREATION OF ARTICLE V ...................................... 505 II. HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF THE CORWIN AMENDMENT .......................................................... 512 III. LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE CORWIN AMENDMENT ......................................................... 520 A. Debate in
    [Show full text]
  • For All the People
    Praise for For All the People John Curl has been around the block when it comes to knowing work- ers’ cooperatives. He has been a worker owner. He has argued theory and practice, inside the firms where his labor counts for something more than token control and within the determined, but still small uni- verse where labor rents capital, using it as it sees fit and profitable. So his book, For All the People: The Hidden History of Cooperation, Cooperative Movements, and Communalism in America, reached expectant hands, and an open mind when it arrived in Asheville, NC. Am I disappointed? No, not in the least. Curl blends the three strands of his historical narrative with aplomb, he has, after all, been researching, writing, revising, and editing the text for a spell. Further, I am certain he has been responding to editors and publishers asking this or that. He may have tired, but he did not give up, much inspired, I am certain, by the determination of the women and men he brings to life. Each of his subtitles could have been a book, and has been written about by authors with as many points of ideological view as their titles. Curl sticks pretty close to the narrative line written by worker own- ers, no matter if they came to work every day with a socialist, laborist, anti-Marxist grudge or not. Often in the past, as with today’s worker owners, their firm fails, a dream to manage capital kaput. Yet today, as yesterday, the democratic ideals of hundreds of worker owners support vibrantly profitable businesses.
    [Show full text]
  • Joe Mccarthy and the Red Scare
    Joe McCarthy and the Red Scare "We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men--not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular." ~Edward R. Murrow Overview In this lesson, students will study the effects of the actions of Joseph McCarthy and the Red Scare on American life in the 1950’s. During the warm up, students will be set up to replicate the actions of Senator McCarthy by accusing particular people of being communist, with no information other than a picture. Students will then receive an overview of the First Red Scare, as well as gain an understanding of the foreign and domestic reasons for the Second Red Scare, via an interactive Power Point presentation. The lesson culminates with students creating television commercials and campaign posters supporting or opposing the reelection of Senator Joe McCarthy. Grade 11 NC Essential Standards for American History II • AH2.H.1.2- Use Historical comprehension… • AH2.H.1.3- Use historical analysis and interpretation… • AH2.H.1.4- Use historical research… • AH2.H.2.1 - Analyze key political, economic, and social turning points since the end of Reconstruction in terms of causes and effects (e.g., conflicts, legislation, elections, innovations, leadership, movements, Supreme Court decisions, etc.).
    [Show full text]