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Interstate Commerce Act
Congress passes the Interstate Commerce Act, creating the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to regulate the railroads. The Supreme Court interprets the ICC's powers so narrowly that it is rendered essentially powerless by the early twentieth century. -
McKinley Shot and Dead
President McKinley is shot by anarchist Leon Czolgosz at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York.
President McKinley dies from complications relating to his shooting and Vice President Theodore Roosevelt becomes the 26th president of the United States. -
Coal miner strike
Anthracite coal miners go on strike in Pennsylvania, protesting the deplorable working conditions of the mines and in the mining towns. Strike ends that year of October. -
Financial Panic
A financial panic strikes the nation. Conservative Republicans incorrectly argue that Progressive reforms have caused this economic downturn. In the absence of a Federal Reserve Bank or any real regulatory control over American businesses, financiers like J.P. Morgan take steps to rectify the economic instability. -
Fire Ignites Public
fire breaks out in the supposedly "fireproof" Asch building where Triangle Waist Company occupied the eighth, ninth, and tenth floors. The workers are locked inside the factory; some jump to their deaths to avoid burning alive. In all, 146 people die in the blaze, all within half an hour. This incident ignites public opinion against -
America Declares Waron Germany
President Wilson appeared before a joint session of Congress and asked for a declaration of war against Germany in order to "make the world safe for democracy." On April 4, Congress granted Wilson's request. America thus joined the carnage that had been ravaging Europe since 1914. Germany's renewal of unrestricted submarine warfare and the revelation of a proposed German plot to ally with Mexico against the US prompted Wilson's action. -
The New Deal
n the 1928 election, President Hoover had promised Americans ‘a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage ... but by 1932, America was in depression.
In the November 1932 election, therefore, Roosevelt promised ‘a new deal for the American people’ if they elected him. The result was a landslide – Roosevelt won 42 of the 48 states, the biggest election victory of all time. -
The Great Depression
Although the United States had experienced several depressions before the stock market crash on October 27, 1929, none had been as severe nor as long lasting before "Black Thursday" struck Wall Street. At first, economists and leaders thought this was a mild bump, perhaps merely a correction of the market, or in any case, no worse than the recession the nation suffered after World War I. -
Wall Street Crash
he American stock market collapses, signaling the onset of the Great Depression. The Dow Jones Industrial Average peaks in September 1929 at 381.17—a level that it will not reach again until 1954. The Dow will bottom out at a Depression-era low of just 41.22 in 1932. -
Isolation
At the dawn of the '30s, foreign policy was not a burning issue for the average American. The stock market had just crashed and each passing month brought greater and greater hardships. American involvement with Europe had brought war in 1917 and unpaid debt throughout the 1920s. Having grown weary with the course of world events, citizens were convinced the most important issues to be tackled were domestic. Foreign policy leaders of the 1930s once again led the country down its well-traveled pa -
Holocaust
The Holocaust was the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of approximately six million Jews by the Nazi regime and its collaborators. The Nazis, who came to power in Germany in January 1933, believed that Germans were "racially superior" and that the Jews, deemed "inferior," were an alien threat to the so-called German racial community. -
The Cold War
As World War II came to a close, the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics began a decades-long struggle for supremacy known as the Cold War. For more than forty years and through a series of crises, America's Cold War presidents protected the U.S. from Soviet threat without starting a third World War. -
Social Transformation
A period of post-war prosperity allowed the United States to undergo fundamental social change. Adding to this change was an emphasis on scientific inquiry, the shift from an industrial to a technological/service economy, the impact of mass media, the phenomenon of suburban and Sun Belt migrations, and the expansion of civil rights. -
THE END OF THE VIETNAM WAR
After many years of U.S. economic and military support for the government of South Vietnam, the Vietnam War ended with the fall of Saigon in late April 1975. North Vietnamese gained control of the first province they had won in fifteen years of war. -
CONFRONTING THE NUCLEAR THREAT
President Jimmy Carter's efforts resulted in legislation to slow the spread of nuclear weapons and a major arms control treaty to lessen the probability of nuclear war. The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I), was signed by President Nixon and Soviet General Secretary Brezhnev at the Moscow Summit in May 1972. -
PROTECTING THE FUTURE
Jimmy Carter's vision for America led him to develop long-range policies on energy, education, and the environment. The president had to persuade a disbelieving public that the energy crisis was real as he began work on a comprehensive energy program. -
PERSIAN GULF WAR
The Gulf War was an international event, best understood in the broad context of the Cold War's end and the search for a new world order to follow. This conflict touched nations in every continent. -
FALL OF THE SOVIET UNION
In December of 1991, as the world watched in amazement, the Soviet Union disintegrated into fifteen separate countries. Its collapse was hailed by the west as a victory for freedom, a triumph of democracy over totalitarianism, and evidence of the superiority of capitalism over socialism. The United States rejoiced as its formidable enemy was brought to its knees, thereby ending the Cold War which had hovered over these two superpowers since the end of World War II. -
Terriost Attacks on World Trade Center
On September 11, 2001, terrorists attacked the Unites States. They hijacked four airplanes in mid-flight. The terrorists flew two of the planes into two skyscrapers at the World Trade Center in New York City. The impact caused the buildings to catch fire and collapse. Another plane destroyed part of the Pentagon (the U.S. military headquarters) in Arlington, Virginia. The fourth plane crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Officials believe that the terrorists on that plane intended to destroy ei -
World War II
the Second World War was the most widespread and deadliest war in history, involving more than 30 countries and resulting in more than 50 million military and civilian deaths (with some estimates as high as 85 million dead). Sparked by Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Poland in 1939, the war would drag on for six deadly years until the final Allied defeat of both Nazi Germany and Japan in 1945. -
The Rise and Fall of the Berlin Wall
From 1961 to 1989, the Berlin Wall stood as a symbol of the Cold War and the difficult relationship the Communist Bloc countries of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union had with the democratic states of Western Europe and the United States. For millions of East German citizens, however, the Wall was much more than just a symbol. It was a barrier isolating them from the freedom of Western Europe.
