Those who abstained from college education were limited to the possibility of drafting or fleeing the nation, with “an estimated 500,000 men [becoming] draft dodgers” (Backderf, 2020, p. 28). Draft evasion, however, was a crime punishable by fines and jail time. In addition to the war, many civil rights issues came to fruition. There were protests for women’s rights, equal rights between blacks and whites, and protests against the Cambodian invasion that led us further into war. Many of these protests were held by students, including Black United Students, World Historians Opposed to Racism and Exploitation, Students for a Democratic Society, and the Youth International Party.
As David Farber illustrates in The Age of Great Dreams: America in the 1960s, “Between the summer of 1964, when the Johnson administration achieved passage of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, and the April 1965 antiwar rally, the American combat role in Vietnam had escalated greatly” (141). In the mid 1960s, a bloody and violent war was in full swing overseas between Vietnamese and American soldiers. On the American home front though, citizens of the US began to question whether it was wise to remain in the war or pull American troops back home. Two major groups began to spring up: advocates for the war and those against it.
The 1960’s and early 1970’s was a period when America was involved in many conflicts overseas, including the Vietnam War. This began a time when media spread quickly as well as influenced the public heavily and wars were first televised. These conflicts ultimately caused citizens to protest and question the motives of the federal government. A large number of these protestors were students who sought to combat problems through various tactics to get authority figures to remedy the problems they identified. Student protestors sought to combat many immediate and long-term problems involving this time period and the Vietnam War.
This negative opinion in turn hurt SNCC more than was anticipated as “Observers failed to recognize that SNCC’s success in the early 1960s was aided by the threat of federal intervention against a vulnerable southern political system” (178). By deterring whites from involvement SNCC also denied moderate liberals, as “Identification with SNCC’s radicalism was effective only to the extent that SNCC was allied with moderate civil rights forces, since it had not developed an independent base of support” (179). By losing all support from moderates, SNCC instead prided itself on militancy, this encouraged “many young radicals who did not wish to conform with prevailing American values, SNCC appeared to offer an outlet for discontent without the compromise of individual ideals.” (178). Acting as a further disconnect between traditional liberals and the New Left, which in itself created a vicious cycle of SNCC seeking more radical allies, while losing more moderate ones.
The Vietnam War marked a period in history in which public radicalization jeopardized the way America lived up to its ideals. As Professor Jeremi Suri argues in his book, Power and Protest, with the “excessive police force,” the activism taking place grew more radical. The “shared movement” against police, military, and political authority continued to grow stronger and furthered domestic chaos amidst the war. In addition, there was great support for the use of violence in the want for change, to the extent to which those supporting “nonviolent change garnered far less support” on protests against the war. The war in Vietnam threatened domestic ideals as groups striving for change, without the use of violence, “turned to guerilla warfare.”
1. The carnage, death-toll, and emotional impact that the Vietnam War brought a very negative impact upon America as a nation. Being the first televised war in United States History, public support exponentially dropped over the course of four to five years. This brought great changes within the political climate as well as upon the well-being of the veterans who managed to survive and return home, causing this be one of America’s most disastrous war. However, while the Vietnam War was raging on, it is also important to acknowledge and analyze the change in social climate that occurred throughout the 1960’s and 1970’s. As more protests arose in opposition towards the war effort, several minority groups took advantage of the situation and formed
From the mid-60s and until the 70s, more liberal new laws were passed than any other period since FDR’s liberalism wave. However, liberalism was under attack from two directions. In one hand, civil rights activists were impatient and unsatisfied with civil rights progress. These young activists were not only disapproving the “slow” civil right progress or the war in Vietnam, but they were also refusing anything linked in the cold war liberalism.
The SDS’s main issue revolved around the Vietnam War and particularly about matters relating to war, for instance, the drafting of students. The organization essentially wanted to create a “New Left” (Document 7). The Black Panther Party originally wanted to protect African Americans from acts of police brutality. However, along with putting an end to police brutality, they soon developed into a group who also wanted the release of all African Americans from jail and compensation for exploitation by white Americans (Document 8). The United Farm Workers ultimately wanted to improve migrant farmworkers wages and working conditions (Document 9).
The sixties was a decade unlike any other. Baby boomers came of age and entered colleges in huge numbers. The Civil Rights movement was gaining speed and many became involved in political activism. By the mid 1960s, some of American youth took a turn in a “far out” direction. It would be the most influential youth movement of any decade - a decade striking a dramatic gap between the youth and the generation before them.
During the decade of the 1960’s, the United States began to fully celebrate youth culture in a way that had only begun to brew in the 1950’s. Youth culture began to rise and was thrust into mainstream America because what was occurring was a widespread rebellion against the mass society occurring in young, college students. It was a rebellion against the 1960’s politics of the United States, the Vietnam War, and the culture of the older generation in general. However, this rebellion occurred exclusively among American youth that came from white, middle to upper class, and affluent families and were given the privilege of attending college. While the sense of alienation and estrangement was certainly present in the entire generation, rebellion
Student for a Democratic Society In the early 1960s a group called the Student for a Democratic Society (SDS) was established it is an organization that later made a strong New Left movement. New Left is a name for the generation of Americans mainly include college and university students. The New Left movement is a movement that stands for the civil rights, gay rights, abortion, drugs and to go against the Vietnam War and military draft policies that started as nonviolent but then turned out to be aggressive and militant as the war developed and many more. SDS is one of the most effective and long lasting student activist organization it has an impact on our society today.
To many, the war in Vietnam was a senseless war. As a result, anti-war protests launched all over America as a forum for those who were ready to see the end of the brutal exploitation. Prior to 1965, small Vietnam war protests were held by individuals searching for peace but quickly grew into a prominent part of the war as we remember it today. This paper will discuss the timeline of Vietnam war protests as well as the most prominent groups and individuals that promoted an end to the violence.
Moreover, immediate and lasting results were also achieved in the field of freedom of speech. The right to free speech and political activities on college campuses has been pushed for by hippies and remains in place to this day. Even though it is not accurate to reduce the Civil Rights Movement to hippies, the latter were clearly major actors in that political framework. Moreover, the embrace of further progressivist ideals such as the use of marijuana and same-sex relationships by hippies continued to influence the sociopolitical discourse in America years after the movement virtually came to an
The 1960’s was a decade of wars, Civil Right protests, assassinations of significant and public figures, and the first man on the moon for America. The Vietnam War, in particular, was a huge issue both outside the country and inside the country. Nowadays people believe the only war during this time was the one over in Vietnam but another significant war was taking place inside America. The Vietnam War practically split America into two different groups: the war supporters and the anti-war protesters. Many protesters were enraged that the Vietnam War was causing so much death and destruction.
A. Knox Clark Princeton University WRI 153- “Protest!”, Peter Johannesson Draft for Paper Number 3 One of the greatest examples of student protest to occur in the modern era is the backlash against the war in Vietnam. Protests occurred in different settings all over the United States; in this paper I will focus on the student protests against the war in Vietnam that occurred at colleges and universities across the country. The Vietnam War, of course, was not the first time students had banded together to protest actions of our government. The antiwar student activism of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s traces its roots all the way back to the early days of our nation.
