Cultural Conflicts

Section 9.3

Today’s Agenda

• 9.3 Slide Show

• KKK Presentation

• Homework

– Read 9.3

– Unit Test on Roaring 20s this Thursday

• Based on all of chapter 8, 9.2 & 9.3

Today we will be able to identify the issues that created cultural conflicts in the 1920’s by analyzing the outcomes of:•The Scopes Trial

•The KKK in the 1920’s

•Prohibition Laws

•Immigration Laws in the 1920’s

Is America morally bankrupt?

How much influence should religion have over our government, our laws?

Fibonacci sequence

Cultural Conflicts

What issues sparked the Scopes Trial?•“The Monkey Trial” (1925)•Trial over legality of teaching Evolution over Creationism in public schools•Evolution

–Charles Darwin’s theory that all species change over time–Suggested that the Bible was inaccurate

•Creationism –Belief that all humans came from Adam and Eve

• Butler Act– Tennessee law that forbade

teaching of any story that denied the story of creation (the Bible)

• ACLU – American Civil Liberties

Union• Sought a teacher willing

to violate the law and test it in court

• John Scopes – Science Teacher in Dayton

Tenn.– Agreed to challenge the

law by teaching evolution

What issues sparked the Scopes Trial?

• Clarence Darrow- Famed Urban Liberal, hired by the ACLU to defend Scopes.

• William Jennings Bryan- Joined the Prosecution.– Three time presidential

candidate– Champion of Rural

America– Fundamentalist Christian

• Believed in literal interpretation of the Bible

• Circus-like atmosphere– Hundreds of reporters

Describe the Scopes Trial.

What was the outcome of the Trial?• Scopes found guilty• Fined $100• Darrow exposed

contradictions in Bible and Creationist argument

• Showed the cultural division within the country

Scopes Trial

Should the Government have the right to control what you do?

What is social engineering?• Governmental policies

meant to shape moral behavior of citizens

• Fundamentalist Christians

– believed behavior should and could be controlled

• Encouraged passage of 18th Amendment

– Volstead Act- Act created to enforce prohibition

Did prohibition decreased the consumption of alcohol?

• Only lower classes• Closed saloons

–Speakeasies too expensive

• Most Americans ignored the law

• Hard to enforce

Why was Prohibition hard to enforce?

• 10, 000 miles of coastline• Bootlegging was so

profitable• Alcohol legal at drug

stores, on ships off the coast

• Distilling easy• Corruption

– Police force easily bribed• Too few government agents

to enforce it

How could one acquire alcohol?

• Speakeasy

• Neighborhood distillery

– Took Prohibition agent 35 seconds to get a drink in New Orleans

• “prescription” from pharmacist

Who was Al Capone?

• Head of Chicago bootlegging gang

• Controlled network of organized crime

– Owned distilleries, trucks, speakeasies, judges, police commissioners

• Used violence, bribery

• Even bribed public

Prohibition

Ku Klux Klan Presentation

Ku Klux Klan

Describe the KKK of the 1920s.• Rapidly growing in Midwest

and Northeast• Originated during

Reconstruction• New Klan hated:

– Blacks, Mexicans, Japanese, Jews, French Canadians

• Hooded robes, burning crosses

• Attracted uneducated poor whites

• Chapters in Detroit, Pittsburg, New Jersey, and Indianapolis– Reaction to Great Migration

Describe the Klan’s Creed.• Racial purity• Nordic racial

superiority• guardians of

traditional American morals

• 5 million members • Declined after 1925

– Klansman David Stephenson convicted of rape and murder

Effects of the KKK

How did immigration change during the 1920s?

• Foreigners viewed as corrupting force on traditional values

• Immigration Act (1921)– Quota – Limited number of all countries to

3% of that ethnic group (1910 census)

• Ex. 100, 000 Italian immigrants in US in 1910

• Only 3 thousand allowed in 1921

• National Origins Act (1924)– Reduced quota to 2% (1890

census)– Excluded Asians altogether

Speakeasy Simulation • Presentations

– Volstead Act– Capone– Flapper– Ness– Duke Ellington– Josephine

Baker– Babe Ruth