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The USA 1945–1974: The People and the State

Fears of Communism at home, the Red Scare and McCarthyism

  • 6 things to know
  • Paper 1

Overview

Why Communism at home was feared, the Loyalty Program and HUAC, the Freedom Train, Hollywood's films and the Pledge of Allegiance, J Edgar Hoover and the Rosenbergs, the Hollywood Ten and the blacklist, The Crucible, and McCarthyism, its support and its end.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Numbers

How did the US government and Hollywood respond to fears of Communism at home after 1947?

Key term

Why did many in the US government fear Communism at home after 1945?

Key term

What happened to the Hollywood Ten in 1947?

Key term

What was the Hollywood blacklist?

Key term

What did Truman’s Federal Employees Loyalty Program of 1947 introduce?

Key term

Why did so many Americans support McCarthy?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    Why did many in the US government fear Communism at home after 1945?

    Model answer

    The Soviet Union had become a rival superpower, and officials believed Communist agents were secretly at work inside government, trade unions and the film industry.

  2. 2

    What did Truman’s Federal Employees Loyalty Program of 1947 introduce?

    Model answer

    Loyalty boards that investigated the political beliefs and associations of federal workers, who could be dismissed if judged disloyal.

  3. 3

    Which congressional committee investigated suspected Communist influence in American life?

    Model answer

    The House Un-American Activities Committee, which questioned witnesses about their own beliefs and about the people they knew.

  4. 4

    What was the Freedom Train that toured the country from 1947?

    Model answer

    A travelling exhibition of the founding American documents, sent from city to city to remind citizens of their national values.

  5. 5

    How did Hollywood help the campaign against Communism at home?

    Model answer

    Studios made anti-Communist films, such as The Red Menace of 1949, which showed Communists as deceitful enemies of ordinary Americans.

  6. 6

    What words were added to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954, and why?

    Model answer

    The words ‘under God’, to mark the USA out from the officially atheist Soviet Union.

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