CHAPTER 1 

A brief history of the US 

1. From colony to revolution: 

1.1. The colonial era: 

The English hoped to build a "city upon a hill" in America, which means that it would be an ideal world, a guiding light, an example for the whole world. 

1.2. Wars: 

* French vs. English: 

- During the 18th century, in North America. 

- In 1763, English took control of Canada and all of North America east of the Mississippi. 

* American Revolution: 

- After the war versus French, Britain grew intervention in American by imposing new taxes (the Sugar Act, the Stamp Act, the Tea Act...) 

- The colonists resented the new taxes imposed by the mother country and resisted the quartering of English soldiers ==> all the taxes, except for tea, were removed. 

- In 1773, the Boston Tea Party was staged; a group of patriots boarded British merchant ships and dumped 342 crates of tea into Boston harbor. 

- The Tea Act, passed by Parliament on May 10, 1773, would launch the final spark to the revolutionary movement in Boston. The act was not intended to raise revenue in the American colonies, and in fact imposed no new taxes. It was designed to prop up the East India Company which was floundering financially and burdened with eighteen million pounds of unsold tea. This tea was to be shipped directly to the colonies, and sold at a bargain price. The Townshend Duties were still in place, however, and the radical leaders in America found reason to believe that this act was a maneuver to buy popular support for the taxes already in force. The direct sale of tea, via British agents, would also have undercut the business of local merchants. 

- In 1774, the First Continental Congress was convened to discuss the colonies' opposition to British rule ==>Aprial 19, 1775, war broke out. 

- The Continental Congress adopted a Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. 

- At first, with few provisions and little training, American troops were outnumbered and overpowered by the British. But in 1777, with the help of France, Americans defeated British Army at Saratoga, New York. 

- In 1781, the last major battle took place at Yorktown, Virginia. 

- In the Treaty of Paris in 1783, England recognized American independence. 

1.3. A new nation: 

- To avoid excessive central power, the government was divided into 3 branches - legislative (Congress), executive (the president and the federal agencies), and judicial (the federal courts). 

- George Washington was the first US president. 

- Thomas Jefferson was the third one. He purchased the vast Louisiana Territory from France, almost doubling the size of the US.

2. Slavery and the civil war: 

- The first American blacks were brought to English North America on a Dutch ship and sold at Jamestown in 1619. 

- In 1828 Andrew Jackson was the first "outsider" to be elected as the US president. During his era, there were big conflicts between the abolitionists and the slave holders, between the North and the South of America. 

- In 1820 southern and northern politicians debated the question of slavery. Congress reached a compromise in which slavery was permitted in the new state of Missouri and the Arkansas Territory. 

- In 1850, another compromise admitted California as a free state, with the citizens of Utah and New Mexico being allowed to decide whether they wanted slavery within their borders or not, in essence they did not. 

- After the slavery's foe Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860, 11 states left the Union and proclaim themselves the Confederate States. The American Civil War between the Union Army and the Confederate Army began. 

- After a long campaign involving forces commanded by the Confederate General Lee and the Union General Grant, the Confederates surrendered. The Civil War ended in 1865, the North won, putting an end to slavery in the country. 

3. The late 19th century: 

- Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, his successor was Andrew Johnson - a southerner who had remained loyal to the Union during the war. 

- Within a few years after the end of the Civil War, the US became a leading industrial power: 

* In 1869, the first transcontinental railroad was completed. 

* The petroleum industry prospered, John D. Rockefeller of the Standard Oil Company became one of the richest men in America. 

* Andrew Carnegie built a vast empire of steel mills in the US. 

* Textile mills multiplied in the South, and meat-packing plants sprang up in Chicago, Illinois. 

* With a series of inventions: the telephone, the light bulb, the phonograph, the motion pictures..., an electrical industry flourished. 

* The steel-frame construction was used to build up the skyscrapers. 

* Problem: the mergence of corporations - known as "trusts" - created monopoly. To counteract them, the federal government passed the Sherman Antitrust Act in 1890 which banned trusts, mergers, and business agreements "in restraint of trade". 

- In 1867, America purchased Alaska from Russia. 

- After the war versus Spain in 1898, the US gained a number of possessions from Spain such as Cuba, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam. 

- In an unrelated action, the US also acquired the Hawaiian Islands. 

- In 1959, Hawaiian and Alaska became the US states. 

4. War and peace: 

4.1. The progressive movement: 

- Despite the signs of prosperity, up to half of all industrial workers still lived in poverty. 

- The prevailing economic dogma was laissez faire: let the government interfere with commerce as little as possible. 

- About 1900 the Progressive Movement arose to reform society and individuals through government action. 

- The Socialist Party, led by Eugene V. Debs, advocated a peaceful, democratic transition to a state-run country, but socialism never found a solid footing in the US. 

4.2. The world war I: 

- Erupted in Europe in 1914, the World War I firstly did not affect the US so American stayed neutral. 

- However, Germany's declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare against all ships bound for Allied ports undermined that position, US decided to get involved in the War. 

- By the fall of 1918, Germany's position had become hopeless. In October Germany asked for peace, and an armistice was declared on November 11. 

- In 1919, US President Woodrow Wilson went to Versailles to help draft the peace treaty. His idea of a League of Nations was included in the Treaty of Versailles, but the US Senate did not ratify the treaty, and the US did not participate in the league. 

4.3. The domestic affairs: 

- Americans became hostile to foreigners in their midst. In 1919, a series of terrorist bombings produced the "Red Scare" with political meetings were raided and several hundred foreign-born political radicals were deported. 

- Congress enacted immigration limits in 1921 and tightened them further in 1924 and 1929. These restrictions favored immigrants from Anglo-Saxon and Nordic countries. 

- The 1920s were an extraordinary and confusing time, when hedonism coexisted with puritanical conservatism; it was also the Roaring Twenties, the age of jazz and spectacular silent movies and such fads as flagpole-sitting and goldfish-swallowing. The racist named Ku Klux Klan attracted new followers and terrorized blacks, Catholics, Jews, and immigrants. 

- For big business, the 1920s were golden years, the US was a consumer society with booming markets for radios, home appliances, synthetic textiles, and plastics. 

- Henry Ford introduced the assembly line into automobile factories, by mass-producing he could pay high wages and still earn enormous profits. 

- However, the economic bubble in stock markets happening in 1929 triggered a worldwide depression. 

5. The great depression: 

- By 1932 thousands of American banks and over 100.000 businesses had failed. 

- Industrial production was cut in half. 

- Wages had decreased 60%, one out of every four workers was unemployed. 

- Meanwhile, Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president on the platform of "a New Deal for the American people". 

- Roosevelt's New Deal did not end the Depression. Although the economy improved, full recovery had to await the defense buildup preceding America's entry into World War II.

6. The World War II and the Cold War  

6.1. The world war II 

* 1939: the outbreak of war in Europe. America is neutral 

* December 1941, America was in the war due to the bombing of Pearl Harbor naval base in Hawaii by the Japanese. 

* May 5th, 1949: German surrendered  

* August, 1949: The war against Japan swiftly ended when President Harry Truman ordered the use of atomic bombs against the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

6.2. Explanations for some terms 

* NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization): An organization formed by 12 nations including the United States, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and the United Kingdom.

* The Watergate incident - referred to an array of illegal and secret activities undertaken by members of the Nixon administration. The activities became known in the aftermath of five men being caught breaking into Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate office building in Washington, D.C. on June 17, 1972. The White House made matters worse by trying to conceal its connection with the break-in. Eventually, tape recordings made by the President himself revealed the problem and on August 9, 1974, Nixon resigned from office.

* The Berlin wall (August 13, 1961 - November 9, 1989): was the physical division between West Berlin and East Germany. However, it was also the symbolic boundary between democracy and Communism during the Cold War. The Berlin Wall was erected in the dead of night and for 28 years kept East Germans from fleeing to the West. Its destruction, which was nearly as instantaneous as its creation, was celebrated around the world. After the Berlin Wall came down, East and West Germany reunified into a single German state on October 3, 1990.