The 1960s in America: Crash Course US History #40

Summary

Dieses Crash Course-Video bietet einen Überblick über die 1960er Jahre in der US-Geschichte, ein Jahrzehnt geprägt von sozialen Bewegungen und politischen Veränderungen. Es behandelt Themen wie den Bürgerrechtsbewegungen, die Vietnamkriegsproteste, die Entwicklung des Feminismus und andere Freiheitsbewegungen. Es zeigt auch die Reaktionen auf diese Ereignisse und deren langfristige Auswirkungen auf die Gesellschaft und die Regierung der Vereinigten Staaten.

Takeaways

• 😀 Die 1960er Jahre waren ein wichtiger Zeitraum in der US-Geschichte, geprägt von sozialen und politischen Veränderungen.
• 🎓 Die Bürgerrechtsbewegung begann in den 1950er Jahren, aber viele ihrer bedeutendsten Ereignisse fanden in den 1960er Jahren statt.
• 👨‍🍳 Sit-ins und Freiheitsfahrten waren wichtige Aktionen, die dazu beigetragen haben, die Rassentrennung in Restaurants und Busen abzuschaffen.
• 📺 Die Berichterstattung über die Bürgerrechtsbewegung, insbesondere die Bilder von Gewalt und Diskriminierung, beeinflussten die öffentliche Meinung und führten zu politischen Veränderungen.
• 🔗 Martin Luther King Jr. und seine Rede 'I have a Dream' waren hochsymbolisch für die Bürgerrechtsbewegung und die Gleichstellung der Menschenrechte.
• 📜 Der Bürgerrechtsgesetz von 1964 und das Wahlrechtsgesetz von 1965 waren bedeutende legislative Erfolge, die die Rechte von AfroamerikanerInnen verbesserten.
• 🌎 Die Bürgerrechtsbewegung inspirierte andere Gruppen, wie Latino-Aktivisten und die American Indian Movement, ihre eigenen Freiheitsbewegungen zu starten.
• 🌈 Die 1960er Jahre brachten auch die Black Power-Bewegung und den Wandel hin zur Selbstbestätigung und Kultur der Afroamerikaner mit sich.
• 🌱 Die Umweltbewegung, mit Werken wie 'Silent Spring' von Rachel Carson, führte zu wichtigen Umweltschutzgesetzen.
• 🚺 Die feministische Bewegung und Publikationen wie 'The Feminine Mystique' von Betty Friedan führten zu einer stärkeren Anerkennung der Gleichstellung von Frauen und der Rechte zur Privatsphäre.

Q & A

Welche Themen wurden in den 1960er Jahren in der US-Geschichte behandelt?

Die 1960er Jahre in der US-Geschichte umfassten Themen wie der Kalten Krieg, der Vietnamkrieg, der aufstrebende Konservatismus, Rassismus, die Kennedys und Camelot, sowie die Figur von Martin Luther King Jr.

Was waren die wichtigsten Ereignisse des Bürgerrechtsbewegungen in den 1960er Jahren?

Die wichtigsten Ereignisse waren die Sit-ins in Greensboro, North Carolina, die Freedom Rides zur Integration von Buslinien, die Birmingham-Proteste und die Rede von Martin Luther King Jr. auf dem Marsch auf Washington.

Wie beeinflussten die Demonstrationen von 1963 Präsident John F. Kennedys Haltung zur Bürgerrechtsbewegung?

Die Demonstrationen von 1963 führten dazu, dass John F. Kennedy die Bürgerrechte aktiver unterstützte und im Juni 1963 öffentlich aufforderte, ein Gesetz zu verabschieden, das Diskriminierung in allen öffentlichen Einrichtungen verbietet.

Was war der Inhalt des Bürgerrechtsgesetzes von 1964?

Das Bürgerrechtsgesetz von 1964 verbot Diskriminierung bei der Beschäftigung, in Schulen, Krankenhäusern, Privatbesitz von öffentlichen Orten wie Restaurants, Hotels und Theatern und auch auf Grundlage des Geschlechts.

Welche Rolle spielte Lyndon B. Johnson in der Verabschiedung des Bürgerrechtsgesetzes?

Nach der Ermordung von John F. Kennedy wurde Lyndon B. Johnson zum Präsidenten und er setzte sich dafür ein, dass das Bürgerrechtsgesetz von 1964 vom Kongress verabschiedet wurde.

Was war das Ziel von Martin Luther King Jr. während des Marsches für Wahlrechte in Selma, Alabama?

Der Marsch für Wahlrechte in Selma, Alabama, initiiert von Martin Luther King Jr., hatte das Ziel, das Wahlrecht für Afroamerikaner zu fördern und die öffentliche Meinung für die Demonstranten zu gewinnen.

Wie beeinflussten die Bürgerrechtsbewegungen andere Gruppen in den Vereinigten Staaten?

Die Bürgerrechtsbewegungen inspirierten andere Gruppen wie Latinos, die American Indian Movement und die Gay Community, ihre eigenen Freiheitsbewegungen zu starten.

Welche Bedeutung hatte die Entscheidung des Supreme Court in Griswold v. Connecticut?

Die Entscheidung im Fall Griswold v. Connecticut begründete das Recht auf Privatsphäre, indem sie das Verbot von Verhütungsmitteln in Connecticut für verheiratete Paare für verfassungswidrig erklärte.

Was war der Hauptinhalt des Buches 'The Feminine Mystique' von Betty Friedan?

Das Buch 'The Feminine Mystique' beschreibt das Problem der Einschränkung von Frauen in der Gesellschaft und führte zur Gründung der National Organization for Women und zu einer stärkeren Frauenbewegung in den 1960er Jahren.

Wie wurde die Umweltbewegung in den 1960er Jahren beeinflusst?

Die Umweltbewegung wurde durch Werke wie 'Silent Spring' von Rachel Carson beeinflusst, die auf die schädlichen Auswirkungen von Chemikalien auf die Umwelt aufmerksam machten und zu wichtigen Umweltgesetzen wie dem Clean Air Act führten.

Outlines

00:00

🌟 1960er Jahre - Eine wichtige Zeit für Amerika

Der Abschnitt behandelt die 1960er Jahre als bedeutende Zeit für die US-Geschichte, mit Ereignissen wie dem Kalten Krieg, dem Vietnamkrieg, der Aufstieg des Konservatismus, der Bedeutung der Kennedys und der Musikgruppen wie den Beatles. Es wird auch auf die zivilrechtlichen Proteste und die Arbeit von Martin Luther King Jr. hingewiesen, der für die Gleichstellung von Schwarzen in Amerika eintrat. Die Studentenbewegung, die Frauenbewegung und die Rechte für Homosexuelle werden als Teil der gesellschaftlichen Veränderungen dieser Zeit genannt. Der Abschnitt hebt auch die Bedeutung des Bürgerrechtsgesetzes von 1964 hervor, das Diskriminierung in Beschäftigung, Bildung und öffentlichen Orten verbietet.

05:04

🏛️ Bürgerrechtsbewegung und soziale Veränderungen

Dieser Abschnitt konzentriert sich auf die Entwicklung der Bürgerrechtsbewegung, die mit Sitzungen in Greensboro, North Carolina, begann, und die Freiheitsfahrten, die darauf abzielten, Rassentrennung auf Bussen zu beenden. Es wird auf die Herausforderungen und Erfolge wie die Desegregation von Bussen durch die ICC hingewiesen. Es wird auch über die verschiedenen Proteste und deren Auswirkungen auf die Gesetzgebung in den USA gesprochen, einschließlich der Bürgerrechts- und Wahlrechtsgesetze. Der Abschnitt deckt auch Lyndon Johnsons Great Society und seine Initiativen zur Bekämpfung der Armut ab, sowie die wachsende Diskrepanz zwischen weißen und schwarzen Haushalten trotz der Verbesserungen.

10:05

🌈 Befreiungsbewegungen und kulturelle Veränderungen

In diesem Abschnitt werden verschiedene Befreiungsbewegungen der 1960er Jahre diskutiert, einschließlich des Wandels von der Integration zur Black-Power-Bewegung, der Aufstieg der Latino-Aktivitäten, der Gründung der American Indian Movement und der beginnenden Gay-Liberation-Bewegung. Es wird auch auf die Rolle der Umweltbewegung und wichtige Gesetzgebungen wie das Clean Air und Water Acts und das Endangered Species Act eingegangen. Der Abschnitt schließt mit einer Diskussion über die amerikanische Feministin und die Veröffentlichung von Betty Friedans 'Das feminine Mysterium', das die Diskriminierung von Frauen in verschiedenen Bereichen der Gesellschaft aufzeigt.

Keywords

💡Zivilrechtsbewegung

Die Zivilrechtsbewegung war ein zentraler Bestandteil der 1960er Jahre und zielt darauf ab, Diskriminierung aufgrund der Hautfarbe zu beenden. Im Video wird sie durch Ereignisse wie Sit-ins in Greensboro, North Carolina, und die Freidemonstrationen hervorgehoben, die letztendlich zur Einführung des Bürgerrechtsgesetzes von 1964 führten.

💡Bürgerrechtsgesetz von 1964

Das Bürgerrechtsgesetz von 1964 war ein wichtiges Gesetz, das Diskriminierung in Beschäftigung, Bildung, Krankenhäusern und anderen öffentlichen Orten verbot. Es wird im Video als ein Meilenstein in der amerikanischen Gesetzgebung betrachtet und als Reaktion auf die friedlichen Proteste der Zivilrechtsbewegung beschrieben.

💡Widerstandsbewegung gegen den Krieg

Die Widerstandsbewegung gegen den Krieg war eine der größten sozialen Bewegungen der 1960er Jahre und konzentrierte sich darauf, gegen den Vietnamkrieg vorzugehen. Im Video wird erwähnt, dass sie die Aufmerksamkeit der Öffentlichkeit auf die Kriegsfolgen lenkte und zu einer erhöhten politischen Unruhe führte.

💡Große Gesellschaft

Die 'Große Gesellschaft' war ein Programm von Präsident Lyndon B. Johnson, das darauf abzielte, Armut, Unabhängigkeit und soziale Ungleichheit zu bekämpfen. Im Video wird erwähnt, dass es wichtige Fortschritte in der Gesetzgebung und im sozialen Schutz erzielte, obwohl es nicht alle Herausforderungen überwunden konnte.

💡Black Power

Black Power war eine politische Bewegung, die im Laufe der 1960er Jahre an Bedeutung gewann und die Selbstbehauptung und die kulturelle Identität afroamerikanischer Menschen förderte. Im Video wird dies als eine Reaktion auf die anhaltende Diskriminierung und als eine Abkehr von der Integrationsbewegung dargestellt.

💡Feminismus

Der Feminismus in den 1960er Jahren konzentrierte sich auf die Gleichstellung der Geschlechter und die Verbesserung der Lebensqualität für Frauen. Im Video wird die Veröffentlichung von Betty Friedan's 'The Feminine Mystique' als Auslöser für die Bewegung hervorgehoben, die zu einer erhöhten politische Aktivität und zu Gesetzgebungsversuchen führte.

💡Umweltbewegung

Die Umweltbewegung der 1960er Jahre war ein Anliegen, das darauf abzielte, die öffentliche Aufmerksamkeit auf Umweltverschmutzung und die Notwendigkeit einer nachhaltigeren Lebensweise zu lenken. Im Video wird 'Silent Spring' von Rachel Carson als ein bahnbrechendes Werk in dieser Bewegung bezeichnet.

💡Vietnamkrieg

Der Vietnamkrieg war ein wichtiger Konflikt der 1960er Jahre, der sowohl in den Vereinigten Staaten als auch international für politische Unruhen und soziale Proteste sorgte. Im Video wird der Krieg als ein Katalysator für die anti-kriegsbewegung und als Ursache für die politische Polarisierung in den Vereinigten Staaten beschrieben.

💡Gewaltsame Rassenaufstände

Die gewaltsamen Rassenaufstände in den 1960er Jahren waren Reaktionen auf die anhaltende Rassentrennung und Diskriminierung. Im Video wird die Aussage des Kerner-Berichts verwendet, um die Ursachen für die Unruhen zu erklären, und es wird auf die schweren Unruhen in Städten wie Newark und Detroit hingewiesen.

💡Gay Liberation Movement

Die Gay Liberation Movement war eine der ersten Bewegungen, die sich für die Rechte lesbischer, schwuler, bisexueller und transgender Menschen einsetzte. Im Video wird die Schlägerei in der Stonewall Inn als der Auslöser für diese Bewegung beschrieben, die zu einer erhöhten öffentlichen Aufmerksamkeit für die Rechte der LGBTQ+-Community führte.

💡Warren Court

Das Warren Court war eine Periode des Supreme Courts unter Chief Justice Earl Warren, die für die Ausweitung der bürgerlichen Rechte bekannt ist. Im Video wird das Court für seine Entscheidungen gelobt, die die Rede- und Pressefreiheit stärkten und die Rechte von Beschuldigten verbesserten.

Highlights

The 1960s were marked by significant social and political changes, including the Cold War, Vietnam War, and civil rights movements.

The decade saw active organizing for change in social order and government, with movements for student rights, women’s rights, and gay rights.

The civil rights movement's key moments included sit-ins in Greensboro, North Carolina, leading to desegregation at Woolworths.

Freedom Rides in 1961 faced violence but were successful in desegregating interstate buses.

By the end of the 1960s, over 70,000 people participated in various civil rights demonstrations.

Martin Luther King Jr.'s protests in Albany, GA, and the struggle for integration at the University of Mississippi were notable but challenging.

The Civil Rights movement reached national prominence with Martin Luther King's efforts in Birmingham, Alabama.

The March on Washington in 1963 was a pivotal moment, featuring King's famous 'I Have a Dream' speech.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a landmark legislation prohibiting discrimination in various sectors.

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 empowered the federal government to oversee voting in discriminatory areas.

The Hart-Cellar Act of 1965 reformed immigration laws, including the removal of national origin quotas.

Lyndon Johnson's Great Society programs aimed to expand the promises of the New Deal, particularly in healthcare.

The shift towards Black Power in the Civil Rights movement reflected a change in strategy and rhetoric.

The anti-war movement gained momentum, especially among students who were against the Vietnam War.

The feminist movement, sparked by Betty Friedan's 'The Feminine Mystique', led to the establishment of the National Organization for Women.

The Supreme Court, under Chief Justice Warren, expanded civil rights and established new rights, such as the right to privacy.

The environmental movement, prompted by books like 'Silent Spring', led to significant environmental legislation.

The 1960s were a decade of both progress and reaction, with movements for liberation and countercultural shifts.

The legacy of the 1960s includes advancements in civil rights, women's rights, and environmental protection, but also a loss of confidence in national leaders.

Transcripts

Hi, I’m John Green, this is Crash Course US History and today we’re gonna talk about

the 1960s. Mr. Green, Mr. Green. Great. The decade made

famous by the narcissists who lived through it.

Hey, Me From the Past, finally you and I agree about something wholeheartedly.

But while I don’t wish to indulge the baby-boomers’ fantasies about their centrality to world

history, the sixties were an important time. I mean, there was the Cold War, Vietnam, a

rising tide of conservatism (despite Woodstock), racism.

There were the Kennedy’s and Camelot, John, Paul, George, and to a lesser extent, Ringo.

And of course, there was also Martin Luther King Jr.

intro So, the 1960s saw people organizing and actively

working for change both in the social order and in government. This included the student

movement, the women’s movement, movements for gay rights, and a push by the courts to

expand rights in general. But, by the end of the 1960s, the anti-war

movement seemed to have overshadowed all the rest.

So as you’ll no doubt remember from last week, the civil rights movement began in the

1950s if not before, but many of its key moments happened in the sixties.

And this really began with sit-ins that took place in Greensboro North Carolina. Black

university students walked into Woolworths and waited at the lunch counters to be served,

or, more likely, arrested. After 5 months of that, those students eventually

got Woolworths to serve black customers. Then, in 1961 leaders from the Congress On

Racial Equality launched Freedom Rides to integrate interstate buses. Volunteers rode

the buses into the Deep South where they faced violence including beatings and a bombing

in Anniston AL. But despite that, those freedom rides also

proved successful and eventually the ICC desegregated interstate buses.

In fact, by the end of the 60s over 70,000 people had taken part in demonstrations, from

sit-ins, to teach-ins, to marches. But they weren’t all successful. Martin

Luther King’s year-long protests in Albany, GA didn’t end discrimination in the city.

And it took JFK ordering federal troops to escort James Meredith to class for him to

attend the University of Mississippi. The University of Mississippi: America’s

fallback college. Sorry, I’m from Alabama. So, the Civil Rights movement reached its

greatest national prominence in 1963 when Martin Luther King came to my hometown of

Birmingham, Alabama, where there had been more than 50 racially-motivated bombings since

WWII. Television brought the reality of the Jim

Crow South into people’s homes as images of Bull Connor’s police dogs and water cannons

being turned on peaceful marchers, many of them children, horrified viewers and eventually

led Kennedy to endorse the movement’s goals. Probably should mention that John F. Kennedy

was president of the United States at the time, having been elected in 1960. He was

assassinated in 1963 leading to Lyndon Johnson. Alright, politics over.

Anyway, in response to these peaceful protests, Birmingham jailed Martin Luther King where

he wrote one of the great letters in American history (doesn’t have a great name): Letter

from Birmingham Jail. 1963 also saw the March on Washington, the

largest public demonstration in American history up to that time where King gave his famous

speech, “I have a Dream.” King and the other organizers called for a

civil rights bill and help for the poor, demanding public works, a higher minimum wage, and an

end to discrimination in employment. Which eventually, in one of the great bright

spots in American history, did sort of happen with the Civil Rights Act.

So, one reason American history teachers focus on the Civil Rights Movement so much is that

it successfully brought actual legislative change.

After being elected president, John F. Kennedy was initially cool to civil rights, but to

be fair, the Cold War occupied a lot of his time, what with the Cuban Missile Crisis and

the Bay of Pigs and whatnot. But the demonstrations of 1963 pushed John

F. Kennedy to support civil rights more actively. According to our dear friend, the historian

Eric Foner, “Kennedy realized that the United States simply could not declare itself the

champion of freedom throughout the world while maintaining a system of racial inequality

at home.”[1] So that June he appeared on TV and called

on Congress to pass a law that would ban discrimination in all public accommodations.

And then he was assassinated. Thanks, Lee Harvey Oswald. Or possibly someone else. But

probably Lee Harvey Oswald. So then, Lyndon Johnson became president and

he pushed Congress to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

The law prohibited discrimination in employment, schools, hospitals, and privately owned public

places like restaurants, and hotels and theaters, and it also banned discrimination on the basis

of sex. The Civil Rights Act was a major moment in

American legislative history, but it hardly made the United States a haven of equality.

So, Civil Rights leaders continued to push for the enfranchisement of African Americans.

After Freedom Summer workers registered people in Mississippi to vote, King launched a march

for voting rights in Selma, Alabama in January, 1965.

And television swayed public opinion in favor of the demonstrators. Thank you, TV, for your

one and only gift to humanity. Just kidding. Battlestar Galactica.

So, in 1965 Congress passed the Voting Rights Act, which gave the federal government the

power to oversee voting in places where discrimination was practiced.

In 1965, Congress also passed the Hart-Cellar Act, which got rid of national origin quotas

and allowed Asian immigrants to immigrate to the United States. Unfortunately the law

also introduced quotas on immigrants from the Western Hemisphere.

Lyndon Johnson’s domestic initiatives from 1965 through 1967 are known as the Great Society,

and it’s possible that if he hadn’t been responsible for America escalating the war

in Vietnam, he might have been remembered, at least by liberals, as one of America’s

greatest presidents. Because the Great Society expanded a lot of

the promises of the New Deal, especially in the creation of health insurance programs,

like Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for the poor.

He also went to War on Poverty. Never go to war with a noun. You will always lose.

Johnson treated poverty as a social problem, rather than an economic one. So instead of

focusing on jobs or guaranteed income, his initiatives stressed things like training.

That unfortunately failed to take into account shifts in the economy away from high wage

union manufacturing jobs toward more lower-wage service jobs. [2]

Here’s what Eric Foner had to say about Johnson’s domestic accomplishments: “By

the 1990s […] the historic gap between whites and blacks in education, income, and access

to skilled employment narrowed considerably. But with deindustrialization and urban decay

affecting numerous families and most suburbs still being off limits to non-white people,

the median wealth of white households remained ten times greater than that of African Americans,

and nearly a quarter of all black children lived in poverty.”

While Congress was busy enacting Johnson’s Great Society programs, the movement for African

American freedom was changing. Let’s go to the ThoughtBubble.

Persistent poverty and continued discrimination in the workplace, housing, education, and

criminal justice system might explain the shift away from integration and toward black

power, a celebration of African American culture and criticism of whites’ oppression. 1964

saw the beginnings of riots in city ghettoes, for instance, mostly in Northern cities.

The worst riots were in 1965 in Watts, in southern California. These left 35 people

dead, 900 injured, and $30 million in damage. Newark and Detroit also saw devastating riots

in 1967. In 1968 the Kerner Report blamed the cause of the rioting on segregation, poverty,

and white racism. Then there’s Malcolm X, who many white people

regarded as an advocate for violence, but who also called for self-reliance. It’s

tempting to see leadership shifting from King to X as the civil rights movement became more

militant, but Malcolm X was active in the early 1960s and he was killed in 1965, three

years before Martin Luther King was assassinated and before all the major shifts in emphasis

towards black power. Older Civil Rights groups like CORE abandoned

integration as a goal after 1965 and started to call for black power. The rhetoric of Black

Power could be strident, but its message of black empowerment was deeply resonant for

many. Oakland’s Black Panther Party did carry guns in self-defense but they also offered

a lot of neighborhood services. But the Black Power turned many white people away from the

struggle for African American freedom, and by the end of the 1960s, many Americans’

attention had shifted to anti-war movement. Thanks, ThoughtBubble. So it was Vietnam that

really galvanized students even though many didn’t have to go to Vietnam because they

had student deferments. They just really, really didn’t want their friends to go.

The anti-war movement and the civil rights movement inspired other groups to seek an

end to oppression. Like, Latinos organized to celebrate their heritage and end discrimination.

Latino activism was like black power, but much more explicitly linked to labor justice,

especially the strike efforts led by Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers.

The American Indian Movement, founded in 1968, took over Alcatraz to symbolize the land that

had been taken from Native Americans. And they won greater tribal control over education,

economic development, and they also filed suits for restitution.

And in June of 1969, after police raided a gay bar, called the Stonewall Inn, members

of the gay community began a series of demonstrations in New York City, which touched off the modern

gay liberation movement. Oh, it’s time for the Mystery Document?

The rules here are pretty simple. I read the Mystery Document, guess the author,

I’m either right or I get shocked. Alright, what have we got here.

If the Bill of Rights contains no guarantee that a citizen shall be secure against lethal

poisons distributed either by private individuals or by public officials [I already know it!],

it is surely only because our forefathers, despite their considerable wisdom and foresight,

could conceive of no such problem.

Rachel Carson! Silent Spring. YES. I am on such a roll.

Silent Spring was a massively important book because it was the first time that anyone

really described all of the astonishingly poisonous things we were putting into the

air and the ground and the water. Fortunately, that’s all been straightened

out now and everything that we do and make as human beings is now sustainable. What’s

that? Oh god. The environmental movement gained huge bipartisan

support and it resulted in important legislation during the Nixon era, including the Clean

Air and Water Acts, and the Endangered Species Act. And yes, I said that environmental legislation

was passed during the Nixon administration. But perhaps the most significant freedom movement

in terms of number of people involved and long-lasting effects was the American Feminist

movement. This is usually said to have begun with the

publication of Betty Friedan’s book The Feminine Mystique, which set out to describe

“the problem that has no name.” Turns out the name is “misogyny.” [3]

Friedan described a constricting social and economic system that affected mostly middle

class women, but it resonated with the educated classes and led to the foundation of the National

Organization of Women in 1966. Participation in student and civil rights

movements led many women to identify themselves as members of a group that was systematically

discriminated against. And by “systemic,” I mean that in 1963,

5.8% of doctors were women and 3.7% of lawyers were women and fewer than 10% of doctoral

degrees went to women. They are more than half of the population.

While Congress responded with the Equal Pay Act in 1963, younger women sought greater

power and autonomy in addition to legislation. Crucially, 60s-era feminists opened America

to the idea that the “personal is political,” especially when it came to equal pay, childcare,

and abortion. Weirdly, the branch of government that provided

most support to the expansion of personal freedom in the 1960s was the most conservative

one, the Supreme Court. The Warren Court handed down so many decisions expanding civil rights

that the era has sometimes been called a rights revolution.

The Warren court expanded the protections of free speech and assembly under the First

Amendment and freedom of the press in the New York Times v. Sullivan decision. It struck

down a law banning interracial marriage in the most appropriately named case ever, Loving

v. Virginia. And although this would become a lightning

rod for many conservatives, Supreme Court decisions greatly expanded the protections

of people accused of crimes. Gideon v. Wainwright secured the right to

attorney, Mapp v. Ohio established the exclusionary rule under the Fourth Amendment, and Miranda

v. Arizona provided fodder for Channing Tatum in his great movie, 21 Jump Street, insuring

that he would always have to say to every perp, “You have the right to remain silent.”

But you can’t silence my heart, Channing Tatum. It beats only for thee.

But, the most innovative and controversial decisions actually established a new right

where none had existed in the constitution. Griswold v. Connecticut, dealt with contraception,

and Roe v. Wade, guaranteed a woman’s right to an abortion (at least in the first trimester).

And those two decisions formed the basis of a new right, the right to privacy.

Protests, the counter culture, and the liberation movements continued well into the early 1970s,

losing steam with the end of the Vietnam war and America’s economy plunging into the

toilet. For many, though, the year 1968 sums up the decade.

1968 began with the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, which stirred up the anti-war protests. Then

racial violence erupted after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4, 1968.

Then, anti-war demonstrators as well as some counter culture types arrived in large numbers

at the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago where they were set upon by police and beaten

in what was later described as a “police riot.”

1968 also saw the Prague Spring uprising in Czechoslovakia crushed by the Soviets. And

student demonstrators were killed by the police in Mexico City where the Olympics were held

and Parisian students took to the streets in widespread protests against, you know,

France. All this unrest scared a lot of people who

ended up voting for Richard Nixon and his promises to return to law and order.

Ultimately, like any decade or arbitrary historical “age,” the 60s defies easy categorization.

Yes, there were hippies and liberation movements, but there were also reactions to those movements.

On this one, I’m just gonna leave it up to Eric Foner to summarize the decade’s

legacy: “[The 1960s] made possible the entrance

of numerous members of racial minorities into the mainstream of American life, while leaving

unsolved the problem of urban poverty. It set in motion a transformation of the status

of women. It changed what Americans expected from government – from clean air and water

to medical coverage in old age. And at the same time, it undermined confidence

in national leaders. Relations between young and old, men and women, and white and non-white,

along with every institution in society, changed as a result.”

But there’s one last thing I want to emphasize. All of this wasn’t really the result of,

like, a radical revolution. It was the result of a process that had been going on for decades.

I mean, arguably a process that had been going on for hundreds of years. Thanks for watching,

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