2.4 - Reactions to CC - rise of silent majority Flashcards
(5 cards)
What were the views of the “great silent majority”?
While protesters and the counterculture made headlines throughout the 1960s, life went on as normal for those whom Nixon described as the ‘great silent majority’ or middle America. The silent majority regarded radicalism, protests, violence and the counterculture with ever increasing horror. From his speeches it is clear that Nixon’s ‘silent majority’ were also those who did not protest against the war, participate in riots or adopt a countercultural pose. When Nixon talked to advisers he used the term ‘middle America’ interchangeably with the ‘silent majority’
How did the January 1968 Tet Offensive influence Americans’ views on Vietnam and Johnson?
By the end of 1967 there were over 500,000 American troops in Vietnam and the war was becoming increasingly unpopular among Americans. So the Johnson administration launched a public relations offensive which claimed that America was winning the war. During the Tet holiday in January 1968 the Vietnamese communists launched their great Tet offensive on South Vietnam. Although American and South Vietnamese forces eventually retook south Vietnam’s cities, American media images showing communities over running the South Vietnamese capital suggested a ‘credibility gap’ between what Johnson was saying about winning the war and what was actually happening. Exhausted by the war and public hostility to his policies Johnson said that he would not stand for re-election but would focus on ending the war. The silent majority did not want to lose the war but hope that America could somehow achieve the ‘peace with honour’ that the republican presidential candidate Richard Nixon promised
How did the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy influence the 1968 election?
The second crisis was the assassination of Martin Luther King by a white racist in March 1968. The assassination provoked major black rights in 100 cities in which 41 died, 3000 were injured, 27,000 arrested and $45 million worth of property was damaged. It took 21,000 federal troops and 34,000 national guardsmen to restore order. The silent majority was tired of black rioting and feared that America had become a divided country in which political dialogue had been replaced by acts of violence. This seemed to be confirmed a few weeks later by the assassination of the democratic presidential candidate Robert Kennedy and then by events at the Democratic National Convention.
- Why did demonstrations at the August 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago aid the rise of the ‘silent majority’?
In August 1968 the Democrats met in Chicago for their National Convention to choose their presidential candidate. The Mobe and the youth international party (Yippies) called on young people to come to Chicago to demonstrate contempt for the American political progress by disrupting this convention. The silent majority watched in horror as:
* Around 30,000 members of the New left arrived in Chicago spreading rumours that they were going to put LSD in the city’s water supply
* Chicago’s mayor Daley mobilised around 12,000 police and banned marches
* the yippies produced their candidate for president ‘Pigasus’ a squealing young pig
* the media revealed students having sex in public and provoking the police (calling them pigs, blowing marijuana smoke in their faces, throwing bags of urine at them, giving him the finger). So removing their badges and nameplates the police retaliated with clubs and gas
Polls recorded 56% approval of police actions against the protesters while one congressman accused radicals of wanting ‘pot instead of patriotism’ and ‘riots instead of reason’ Chicago confirmed and sometimes caused many voters support for the presidential candidate for law and order in 1968 republican Richard Nixon
Nixon was narrowly elected in 1968. If the 1960s was a period of progressive change, why do you think the American public turned to Nixon rather than a Democratic candidate?
By the time of the 1968 presidential election many Americans craved law and order under a return to the good old days before all the disruptions and changes. Although never personally popular, Richard Nixon was a moderate republican associated with the peace and prosperity of the Eisenhower years. He appealed to middle America to the silent majority of law abiding, hardworking patriots. He attracted voters tired of radicalism change and Great Society programmes especially as he promised to bring ‘peace with honour’ in Vietnam. Nixon narrowly defeated the democratic candidate Hubert Humphrey in 1968 he was re-elected in a landslide victory in 1972 assisted by the impact of events during 1969 and 1970 that further alienated conservatives.
