1960s Dbq

“For all the rhetoric of the young and charismatic President, JF Kennedy, and his successor, Lyndon Johnson, for many Americans living in the 1960s the ‘American dream’ remained just that – a dream.”

The 1960s in America was a time of great social and political changes. It was the decade of new frontiers being explored which was initially lead by the young, charismatic, Democrat President John F Kennedy. The American Dream was first introduced in 1931 to be defined as; having individual rights and freedom such as freedom of speech, peaceful protest, equality between races, gender and age. Independence, both as a nation and for individual citizens was symbolised by The Declaration of Independence. Kennedy promised the American people a ‘New

70 million children from the post-war baby boom became teenagers and young adults in the 60s. Under the young and charismatic Kennedy, America was spiralling into an increasing unemployment time where there was more than twice as many people unemployed in 1961 than there was in the 50s. This angered and frustrated youth. The ‘Make Love not War’ slogan became extremely popular, along with their hippie sense of style, drug uses and sexual behaviour. Their actions of turning to peace was due to their anger over the war in Vietnam, racism and the idea of getting well paid jobs. Youth enjoyed the aspect of ‘independence’. They did this by starting a wave of strikes in 1965 effecting almost every university and college. They were going around demanding more in their education and elimination of rules and restriction imposed on them. 500 million youth turned up to join forces in peace, use marijuana and listen to the artists such as Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin who idolised the use of drugs, sex and opposition to the Vietnam War. Youth movement was strong as they were all willing to cross the government, however the youth movement began to fade following a series of violent crackdowns on protesters which involved several deaths and many injuries. Students were no longer even safe on University ground. These events allowed the youth to live their American dream and pursue their education by taking a stand and interest in politics and knowledge. In the 1920s 1/5 Americans completed high school compared to the mid 1960’s almost 3/4 students finished high school . The increase in college campus capacity led the young men and woman to become a vital component of the social movements of the 1960s era. The youth movement of the 1960s lead to a breakthrough in social movement and the ‘American Dream’ became a reality which lead to major changes from the