Conservative Movement In The United States Between The 1960s And The 1980s

The most important reasons why a new conservative movement arose in the United States between the 1960s and the 1980s, were because of the sharp transformations in racial, cultural, and economic issues. Changes to the American way of life had gradually been occurring for years; however, the persistence and resilience of the Civil Rights Movement created a domino effect for the progression of other issues, catapulting change throughout every aspect of American Society. The conservative movement arose as a direct response to those changes. Protests and boycotts created major wins for African Americans, among those were the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, (American Yawp, 28) the desegregation of schools, and the disintegration of racial

The Supreme Court moved to prohibit bible reading in public schools, recreational drug use was on the rise, and minorities were becoming more visible in American culture. All of these were at odds with the way society had always operated. This left the previous generation wanting to counter this “counterculture” and prevent what they would see as the downfall of American standards. Economically, America is having a crisis. There was slow wage growth, rising prices, and growing tax burdens on many working-class people. The economic inequality gap was widening with no end in sight and the pipeline to a good life had dried up for many. Middle-class working Americans needed a more stable economy, and the Republicans who openly opposed liberalism seemed to be the answer. Different areas of American society were all affected by this rapid societal change, and most of them were nostalgic for times that seemed easier, more prosperous, and less chaotic. Each of these unhappy parties turned their efforts into one giant Conservative movement in hopes of countering the rise of liberalism and unsatisfactory political and social

Distrust in the government can be traced back to the Vietnam War. Initially, little was known by the public about why American troops were in Vietnam, only what government officials reported. However, once the media could offer footage from Vietnam directly to television sets across the country, Americans realized that what was being told by the government and what they saw on their televisions were conflicting. This diminished the credibility of the US government, caused anti-war riots, and fractured the trust between the public and the government. (American Yawp, 28) The Great Recession of 2008 was also a notch in the belt of American unrest. The recession magnified the rising income and wealth inequality that only seemed to grow year after year since the 1900s. Working-class people lost their jobs and homes, while banks reported “profit margins not seen in decades” (American Yawp, 30) and were rescued from debt by the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act. This only reinforces the feeling of “The rich get richer, and the poor get poorer” and casts a pessimistic lens over the government for the working-class American people. 2020 is when the biggest fracture between the public happens, in my opinion. COVID-19 caused a global pandemic and people were on “stay at home” orders for about two years. The general