Direct Legislation: Some Implications of Open Housing Referenda

1970 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Howard D. Hamilton
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
The United States ◽  
World War ◽  
American Government ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Pass Through ◽  
Direct Legislation ◽  
Direct Government ◽  
Open Housing

Any middle-aged member of the political science guild in a retrospective mood might ponder a question: “What ever happened to direct democracy?” In our halcyon student days the textbooks discussed the direct democracy trinity—initiative, referendum, and recall—described their mechanics and variations, explained their origin in the Progressive Era, told us that the United States, Australia, and Switzerland were leading practitioners of direct democracy, cited a few eccentric referenda, gave the standard pro and con arguments, and essayed some judgments of the relative merits of direct and representative democracy. Latter day collegians may pass through the portals innocent of the existence of the institutions of direct government. Half of the American government texts never mention the subject; the others allocate a paragraph or a page for a casual mention or a barebones explanation of the mechanics.A similar trend has occurred in the literature. Before 1921, every volume of this Review had items on the referendum, five in one volume. Subsequently there have been only seven articles, all but two prior to World War II. “The Initiative and Referendum in Graustark” has ceased to be a fashionable dissertation topic, only four in the last thirty years. All but two of the published monographs antedate World War II.

Americans All: World War II and the Shaping of American Identity

1981 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 483-518 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Gleason
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Identity ◽  
World War ◽  
American Life ◽  
Present Essay ◽  
The Subject ◽  
General Studies ◽  
Wartime Experience

Although it is four decades since the United States entered World War II, some aspects of the nation's wartime experience are still virtually unstudied. Military and diplomatic historians have labored productively for many years, but historians interested in American social and intellectual developments are just beginning to turn their attention to the wartime era. Recent general studies by Richard Polenberg and John M. Blum are especially welcome since, by drawing greater attention to the period, they should stimulate further research. There is much left to be done because the war affected practically every dimension of American life. The present essay deals with one of its less obvious effects —the way in which it shaped the thinking of a whole generation on the subject of American identity.

TOP-DOWN RELIGION AND THE DESIGN OF POST-WORLD WAR II AMERICAN PLURALISM

2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 233-243
Author(s):  
R. LAURENCE MOORE
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
American Culture ◽  
The United States ◽  
Central Component ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
World War ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Islamic Movements ◽  
The Subject

Academics are falsely rumored to have a low regard for religion. Although Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, authors of The God Delusion and God Is Not Great, respectively, made atheism a best-selling subject in the United States, it is not coincidental that Hitchens and Dawkins are English. They were educated in a country where a strident antipathy toward religion is not unpatriotic. American atheists with as much brass are rare. Kicking religion around cannot be an American sport because, from colonial to contemporary times, religion has been a central component of American culture. To be sure, a lot of scholarly criticism has been directed at right-wing Christian and Islamic movements. But scholars whose personal views on faith incline them to echo Hitchens's mordant formula that “religion poisons everything” should probably look for a country other than the United States to study. The recent books of historians and sociologists of American religion have taken a tone toward the subject that has ranged from gentle to friendly.

The United States, Italy, and the Opening to the Left, 1953–1963

2002 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 36-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leopoldo Nuti
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Test Case ◽  
World War ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Cold War

Drawing on newly declassified U.S. and Italian documentation, this article as-sesses U.S. policy toward Italy under the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations and uses this test case to draw some general conclusions about the nature of U.S. -Italian relations during the Cold War. The first part of the article focuses on issues that have been neglected or misinterpreted in the existing literature on the subject, and the second part presents some of the lessons that can be learned from the study of U.S. -Italian relations in the 1950s and 1960s. The aim is to cast broader light on the current debate about the role and influence of the United States in Western Europe after World War II.

Public Accounting in the United States from 1928 to 1951

1956 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 444-471 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Don Edwards
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
The United States ◽  
Basic Question ◽  
World War ◽  
Public Accounting ◽  
Accounting Practice ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
The Subject ◽  
External Forces ◽  
Almost Continuous

Public accounting practice and the nature of the accounting profession itself has, in the years under consideration, been shaped by a series of external forces. The Great Depression stimulated codification and regulation of practice. Further refinements of auditing procedures were introduced in the wake of the McKesson & Robbins case. The basic question of who was authorized to practice received almost continuous attention, and was the subject of much legislation and some important legal action. World War II introduced new practices, added responsibilities, and certain difficulties. And finally, the emergence of a strong national organization provided the profession with a means for achieving internal consistency and the capacity for co-ordinated reaction to rapid external change.

scholarly journals The problem of American Loans and Credits for Czechoslovakia in 1945–1948

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-81
Author(s):  
A. V. Zorin
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
The United States ◽  
Financial Policy ◽  
World War ◽  
Department Of State ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Post War ◽  
Sphere Of Influence ◽  
Made In

The article is devoted to one of the aspects of the US European policy after World War II: the issue of loans and credits to affected countries. Using the example of Czechoslovakia, the author tries to answer a number of important questions: did Washington have a sound financial and economic policy towards this country, what goals did it pursue, what were its results? The study is based on the US Department of State archive documents and papers of the American ambassador to Czechoslovakia L.A. Steinhardt. The US financial policy towards Czechoslovakia in the early post-war years was the subject of intense debate in the United States. The author reveals evidence of serious disagreement between economic and political divisions of the State Department about providing of financial assistance to Prague, its size and terms of lending. Particular attention is paid to Steingardt’s position and his attempts to determine American loans and credits to Prague by upholding the property interests of American citizens. These disagreements hindered the development of a single thoughtful course regarding the Czechoslovak Republic and complicated diplomatic relations with Prague; negotiations on the allocation of large loans for the economic recovery of the Czechoslovak Republic dragged on. A fundamental role in the establishment of a new US political course had Secretary of State James Byrnes’ decision, made in the fall of 1946, on the inadmissibility of providing assistance to countries that have taken anti-American positions. This approach was finally entrenched after the Communists coup in Czechoslovakia in February 1948, when the country entered the Soviet sphere of influence. The article concludes that the post-war US policy was not distinguished by integrity and thoughtfulness.

The Ring Thing

The Group ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald L. Rosenstein ◽  
Justin M. Yopp
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Sun ◽  
World War ◽  
White Skin ◽  
Left Hand ◽  
Double Ring ◽  
Fourth Finger ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject

The ancient Egyptians were the first to use a wedding ring as a symbol of love and fidelity. Bands were usually made from grass or hemp and worn on the fourth finger of the left hand, which was believed to include the vein that led directly to the heart. The circular shape of the ring—with no beginning and no end—represented eternal love. Over the centuries, societies throughout the world adapted the tradition to fit their own cultures. It was once customary in the United States for only the bride to wear a ring, but this changed during and after the marriage boom that followed World War II. The number of men wearing wedding bands more than quadrupled, and today, double-ring marriage ceremonies are the norm. None of the men in the group had anticipated that “until death do you part” would occur so early in his marriage. After their wives died, what their wedding rings symbolized, and what should be done with them, was far from clear. One evening as the group settled in, Joe reached toward the center of the table to pick out his sub and bag of chips when one of us (Don) noticed something different about his left hand. “Joe, you took off your ring.” All eyes turned to Joe’s left hand. A strip of pale white skin that had been shielded from the sun for nearly twenty years circled the base of his fourth finger. Before that moment, the men had never discussed the subject of wedding rings. The prospect of dating again had compelled Joe to make the change. “It’s not that I’m interested in anyone in particular. In fact, even thinking about going out with someone right now is kind of overwhelming. But, damn, I don’t want to be lonely for the rest of my life. I hope that someday I’ll feel for someone else the way I felt for Joy.” Joe took off his ring because he wanted to believe that one day that time would come.

Affirmation by Mars

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Kenneth Galbraith
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Karl Marx ◽  
The United States ◽  
Harvard University ◽  
World War ◽  
American Government ◽  
Joseph Schumpeter ◽  
Keynesian Economics ◽  
System P

This chapter examines how John Maynard Keynes's ideas appealed to younger economists in America. For the younger generation of scholars, Keynes's views were a welcome alternative to the unemployment and misery that could no longer be defended and also to a commitment to Karl Marx and revolution. Those from Harvard University were of the belief that the Keynesian system came to the United States through their agency. Harvard, would be the germinal point for Keynesian economics in the United States. The chapter considers some of the economists who engaged in the discussion of the Keynesian system as it applied to the United States, including Joseph Schumpeter and Alvin Harvey Hansen. It also discusses Keynes's influence in the late depression period and during World War II, leading Keynesian voices in the American government such as Lauchlin Currie, and the major consequences of World War II for the Keynesian system.

The United States and Eastern Europe in 1945: A Reassessment

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Trachtenberg
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
World War ◽  
American Government ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The World ◽  
The Cold War

This chapter examines the policies pursued by the American government to deal with the problem of Eastern Europe in 1945. At the end of World War II, the Soviet Union, it was said, sought to communize eastern Europe; the western powers, and especially the United States, were deeply opposed to that policy; and the clash that developed played the key role in triggering the Cold War. But historians in recent years have been moving away from that sort of interpretation. American policy is also being seen in a new light by many historians. Increasingly the argument seems to be that U.S. leaders in 1945 did not really care much about eastern Europe—that their commitment to representative government in that region was surprisingly thin and that by the end of 1945 they had more or less come to the conclusion that the sort of political system the Soviets were setting up in that part of the world was something the United States could live with.

Employee Legal Service Plans: Conflicts Between Federal and State Regulation

1976 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 787-853 ◽  
Author(s):  
Werner Pfennigstorf ◽  
Spencer L. Kimball
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
The United States ◽  
Pension Plans ◽  
State Regulation ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Legal Service ◽  
World War ◽  
Department Of Labor ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Wage Increases

Employee pension and welfare plans first appeared in the United States well before the turn of the century, but rapid growth began only in the 1940s, when wartime wage controls, coupled with favorable tax rules, encouraged fringe benefits as a substitute for wage increases. The plans have attained awe-inspiring dimensions since World War II: The Department of Labor estimates 750,000 pension plans and 1,050,000 welfare plans, covering about 35 million persons, with total assets of the pension plans alone growing from $2.4 billion in 1940 to more than $150 billion in 1973. In 1971 the 50,000 largest welfare plans, those with 100 or more participants, paid benefits in excess of $15 billion. But legal service plans, among the most recent of welfare plans and the subject of this study, are still experimental and small; they involve no great amount of resources.

Between the Wars

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry Riley
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
World War I ◽  
The United States ◽  
Food Aid ◽  
World War ◽  
American Government ◽  
The World ◽  
Relief Program ◽  
Bail Out ◽  
The U.S

The years after World War I and before World War II saw famine, death, and revolution in many parts of the world. Russia suffered these calamities and worse. Hoover found himself again caught up in a struggle to feed millions of foreign citizens with American food. This time the supplicant was bolshevist Russia, a hated enemy, where famine had already caused the deaths of millions. The U.S. Congress was even more unwilling than before to aid Russia, wondering out loud why the United States should bail out a country that was so intent on falling to pieces. This chapter recounts how Hoover overcame U.S. legislative resistance and organized a major relief program in a country with an extremely anti-American government, where transport hardly worked, and where social organizations were frozen in indecision. The chapter then sums up the vastly changed character of American food aid over the period 1794–1924.

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