Nation of Nations Concise 2/e Davidson, Gienapp, Heyrman, Lytle, & Stoff
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In the 1970s the majority of Americans turned away from the reform movements associated with the 1960s and 1970s. What currents of social perfectionism that did exist were concentrated more toward countering earlier activism, or in quests-spiritual and material-for individual fulfillment. A conservative resurgence in politics and religion found a symbol and spokesman in Ronald Reagan. Yet many who could afford it simply turned their backs on the larger public arena. "When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping," one popular T-shirt stated. In San Diego, shoppers headed for Horton Mall, one of the many new cathedrals of consumption which in many ways epitomized the temper of the 1980s.

The Conservative Rebellion

Inspiring the conservative call for a return to traditional ideals was a revival of evangelical religion that expressed itself in political activism. Many evangelicals, increasingly vocal about secularizing ideas and trands, criticized the liberal rulings of the Supreme Court on pornography, criminal rights, and, above all, abortion. Religious traditionalists, including Catholics as well as evangelical Protestants, found public education too secular, and the mass media, especially network television, too preoccupied with sex and violence-too hostile to traditional values. Yet to get their message across, traditionally minded religious leaders often adopted sophisticated media technologies. And it was skill in mastering television that helped Ronald Reagan defeat Jimmy Carter during the 1980 presidential campaign.

Prime Time with Ronald Reagan

As president, Reagan used his formidable media skills to communicate his message to the nation. He declared his intention to get government off peoples' backs by reducing federal taxes, federal spending, federal regulation, and inflation. At the same time he was determined that the United States would shake off the unhappy heritage of the Vietnam War and stand tall again. He sought to accomplish that with an aggressive anti-Soviet foreign policy and a sharp increase in defense spending.

Reagan quickly set the public agenda. He dramatized his opposition to labor by breaking a strike by air traffic controllers. His Secretary of Interior James Watt set out to undermine environmental regulations. And the cornerstone of the Reagan revolution was a significant tax cut under the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981. Although tight money policies designed to reduce inflation at first put the economy into recession, an economic expansion soon began. But its impact was uneven. The combination of tax cuts, high unemployment, and cuts in government social programs led to reduced inflation and more jobs, but also to a transfer of an increasing proportion of the nation's wealth from the poor to the rich. At the same time the Defense Department conducted a substantial build-up in all categories of weapons, led by the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI).The first result was spiralling deficits. Neither Reagan nor Congress could agree on a plan to ease growing budget shortfalls.

Standing Tall in a Chaotic World

Reagan easily won reelection, but in his second term he encountered problems in foreign policy that did not yield easy solutions. Efforts to stabilize the situation in the Middle East were jolted by a terrorist attack on a Marine barracks. In Latin America, a rescue operation on the island of Grenada was more public relations success than solution to unrest in the Caribbean, while efforts to topple the Sandinista government in Nicaragua met repeated resistance from Congress.

By 1985 the Reagan administration was frustrated on two fronts: terrorists still held American hostages in Lebanon and the Sandinistas had survived the attacks of American-supported Contra rebels. Officials in the National Security Council began to implement a scheme, first to secretly trade arms to Iranian moderates for release of hostages, and then to use the secret profits from those arms sales to raise money for the Contras. Selling arms to Iran contradicted Reagan's firm public pledges never to deal with terrorists. Aid to the Contras violated the explicit prohibitions of the Boland Amendment, passed by Congress in 1984. But the actions went undetected since they were kept secret-from Congress, from responsible executive agencies, and possibly even from the president himself. When the activities of Robert McFarlane, John Poindexter, and Oliver North became known, Congress investigated what was popularly called "Irangate." While the public seemed relatively uninterested in the scandal, the concept of subordinate officials secretly pursuing illegal policies raised profound Constitutional questions.

Reagan retrieved much of his popularity through a series of dramatic meetings in Iceland and Moscow with the new and charismatic Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev. The two eventually agreed to a treaty that reduced intermediate-range missiles in Europe. With Cold War tensions easing, the economy was robust enough and Republican policies popular enough to assure victory in 1988 for Reagan's vice president, George Bush.

An End to the Cold War

George Bush much preferred to lead in foreign rather than in domestic affairs. At first that strengthened his presidency, as world events dominated the headlines. Most startling was the rapid break-up of the Soviet bloc. In Eastern Europe, nation after nation threw off Communist rule. In 1989 the ultimate Cold War symbol, the Berlin Wall, came tumbling down. By 1991 the Soviet Union disbanded. A significant arms reduction treaty followed.

But as superpower tensions eased, regional conflicts intensified. Bush responded forcefully. When Panama's Manuel Noriega became an embarrassment, Bush sent U.S. forces to topple his government and arrest him. A more threatening crisis arose when Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein sent his troops to conquer oil-rich Kuwait. Bush organized America's allies into a coalition that saddled Iraq with a tight economic boycott, followed by direct military action: Operation Desert Storm in January 1991. Massive air raids devastated Saddam's forces and prepared the way for a smashing invasion that liberated Kuwait. The war ended with Saddam Hussein still in power, however.

Popular acclaim from Desert Storm seemed to assure the President's reelection in 1992. But his popularity eroded due to domestic discontent. The economy soured. Initiatives on the environment and urban redevelopment fell flat. The appointment of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court raised troublesome issues about the sensitivity to women of both the administration and Congress. In 1991 a violent riot ripped Los Angeles. Bank failures, spiralling health care costs, and growing budget deficits raised questions about how government policies could address such problems if government was supposedly the problem. Most damaging for Bush, middle-class voters were hurt by a recession that refused to end. By 1992 voters had turned angry. Some of the anger buoyed the campaign of a Texas maverick, Ross Perot. But many more "Reagan Democrats" returned to the fold to elect Democratic challenger Bill Clinton as a moderate who nonetheless promised activism and change.

The Clinton Presidency

Activism was one thing; real change was another. Clinton found himself challenged in foreign affairs by intractable regional conflicts in former Yugoslavia, Africa and the Caribbean. And in domestic policy, his successes with the budget, North American trade and gun control were offset by defeat of his health care proposal. In 1994 the voters reversed course again, electing conservative Republican majorities in both House and Senate for the first time in forty years.

In 1995, Bill Clinton began moving steadily toward the political center. As the election of 1996 approached, the president adroitly adopted many issues including welfare reform that the Republicans had once called their own. Running against the aging political technician, Senator Robert (Bob) Dole, Clinton won easily and became the first Democrat since Franklin Roosevelt to win a second term in the White House.

On the heels of his reelection, however, the president faced renewed accusations about sexual misconduct--this time with a 21-year-old White House intern--and the possibility that he pressed her to deny the affair under oath. Unless Special Prosecutor Kenneth Starr produced convincing evidence of legal wrongdoing, Bill Clinton appeared likely to serve out his second term.

A Nation of Nations in the Twenty-First Century

If anything, America society-this nation of nations-was in many ways more diverse at the end of the twentieth century than ever before. Social and political stability thus hinged, as in the past, on giving all groups access to the mainstream of American life.

That access was complicated because renewed immigration continued to alter the face of the nation. Latino and Asian immigrants constituted the largest groups of newcomers. Asians, who concentrated heavily in California, Hawaii, and New York City, surpassed Hispanics by the 1980s in supplying the largest number of legal immigrants. Meanwhile, older issues of race prejudice and minority poverty still troubled the nation. A sizable segment of African Americans enjoyed social and economic advances, but a black underclass remained. Hence the policy of affirmative action, even after the Supreme Court had limited its use in the Bakke case, remained controversial. As the end of the century looms, the nation still struggles for unity out of its diversity.

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