1920s represents the transition of the United States - Assignment Example

The 1920’s: Federal Government Responses The 1920’s was a decade of economic prosperity. However, economic depression ofthe agricultural sector and anti-immigrant sentiment marred this period. The Republican government responded by emphatic support of Big Business and appeased public sentiment by passing anti-immigrant legislation.The 1920’s: Federal Government Responses.The decade of the 1920’s, called the ‘New Era,’ or ‘The Roaring Twenties,’ was a period of prosperity after World War I.

However, the uneven distribution of economic prosperity with economic depression in rural areas, and anti-immigrant sentiment, were major problems of the period. The decade’s three Republican Presidents – Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover only partially addressed these issues. The economic growth of the 1920’s did not extend to the agricultural sector and the rural areas. While ‘Big Business’ flourished, farmers income declined. The federal government extended strong support to big business.

‘The American Way’ came to represent weak government regulation of business and less support for labor unions. High tariff policies for foreign goods, repeal of excess profit taxes, cutbacks in the Federal Trade Commission, and government encouragement of price-fixing were responses of the government to support business. This attitude is summed up in President Harding’s request for “less government in business and more business in government” (Schultz, 1999). Despite farmers campaigning for farm relief legislation, Coolidge vetoed the McNary-Haugen bills.

The 1920’s witnessed an upsurge in racism and ‘nativism’: intolerance of African-Americans and immigrants. ‘The Red Scare,’ fear of the Bolshevik menace, cultural fundamentalism, and a revival of public support for the Ku Klux Klan, demonstrated this trend. In response to perceived popular sentiment, the federal government passed the Emergency Quota Act of 1921, and the stricter Immigration Act of 1924, which drastically limited the flow of immigrants from Europe and stopped those from Asia. (Dorn, n.d.) However, although these problems persisted, it cannot be denied that the 1920’s remained a decade of prosperity between World War I and the Great Depression.

ReferencesDorn, Rick. Immigration Restriction and the Ku Klux Klan. In Retrieving the American Past. Department of History. Ohio State University. Retrieved fromhttp://ehistory.osu.edu/osu/mmh/clash/Imm_KKK/anti-immigrationKKK-page1.htmSchultz, Stanley, K. 1999. The Politics of Prosperity: The 1920s. In American History 102. Chapter 15. The University of Wisconsin. Retrieved fromhttp://us.history.wisc.edu/hist102/lectures/lecture15.html