Demobilization: Labor, The Baby Boom & Truman’s Fair Deal US History: Spiconardi

Demobilization The Armed Services

Military reduced from 12 million members to 1.5

Questions: What to do with 10.5 million discharged

men? What to do with the wartime factories?

Demobilization

Servicemen’s Readjustment Act: The G.I. Bill of Rights Considered last piece of New Deal Legislation Created to prevent repeat of Bonus Army March The G.I. Bill of Rights

Authorized billions of dollars to pay veterans’ benefits College education Medical treatment Unemployment insurance Home and business loans

Made it possible for more people to attend college or buy a home than ever before

G.I. Bill

G.I. Bill

Fair Deal Truman’s plan for social improvement

Goals Promote full employment A higher minimum wage Housing assistance Employment compensation for workers out

of work Most of the proposed legislation not

passed by Congress

Taft-Hartley Act Wages could not keep up with inflation Unions went on strike for higher wages US became anti-union & Congress passes

Taft-Hartley Act President could delay a strike (80-days) if it

threatened “national welfare” Barred the “closed shop” no longer had to

belong to a union before being hired “Right-to-work laws” Could take jobs & not

belong to a union Required union leaders to swear they were not

communists

National Military Establishment Act In order to meet post-WWII

international concerns (COLD WAR) two new federal agencies created Department of Defense

Oversees all gov’t agencies relating to national security & the military

National Military Establishment Act Central Intelligence Agency

Obtain and analyze information about foreign governments, corporations, & persons

Use of propaganda to get others to decide in favor of the United States

Covert operations (espionage)

The Baby Boom

The Baby Boom Largest population explosion in US

history No longer economic hardships of Great

Depression, which limited family size Men coming home from war (wink, wink)