Grand Expectations: The United States, 1945-1974 by James T. Patterson Read Free Book Online Page B

euphoria, even hubris in some, capable of the boast that America could do anything: "The impossible takes a little longer." Older myths enjoyed new life—national invincibility and national innocence, for example. Americans won their wars—all of them, so they believed—and fought them all for righteous purposes. New crusades were inspired against old domestic ills and injustices. A War Against Poverty was officially declared, and campaigns were waged to assure equal rights and justice for all.
    The last decade treated in Grand Expectations , however, proved to be crowded with shattered expectations and hopes. The country's longest and most unpopular war, one difficult to call righteous, ended not in victory but in defeat. Fear of nuclear attack in the Cold War drove citizens into bomb shelters at times. The civil rights movement broke apart, and violent mobs set cities aflame, including the capital. The plight of a black underclass became worse. A President was assassinated and so was his brother while seeking the same office. Assassination also proved the fate of the two foremost black leaders of the period, each gunned down in his prime at the age of thirty-nine. Threatened with impeachment for misconduct in the White House, a President resigned in disgrace.
    A period so crowded with contradictions and complexities, so befogged with myths to glorify successes and expectations, as well as myths to justify failures and disgraces, demands talents of a high order on the part of the historian. James Patterson meets those demands with remarkable qualities of skill and courage. No myth is too sacred, no reputation so exalted as to escape his unsparing analysis and plain speaking. At the same time he is always ready to acknowledge good intentions and achievements of high order. His readers will finish this book with a new and deeper understanding of this country and its history.
    A few changes in the plans originally announced for the series of volumes in The Oxford History should be noted. Instead of nine volumes there will be ten to cover that many periods, and there will be one volume on economic history. There is no change in the plan to publish each book as it is completed and to leave each author free of any expectation of conformity in interpretation or point of view.
    C. Vann Woodward

Grand Expectations

Bibliographical Essay

    As footnotes in the text suggest, the literature concerning postwar United States history is vast. This brief bibliographical essay mentions only those books that proved most useful to me. It begins by identifying general interpretations of the era as well as sources concerned with various themes and topics: race relations, religion, the economy, and so on. The bibliography then follows the chronological organization of the chapters, referring to books (for articles, see footnotes) that deal with particular time periods and controversies, beginning with the Truman era and concluding with sources on the early 1970s.
    General interpretations: Among the best books that seek to make sense of this era are William Chafe, The Unfinished Journey: America Since World War II (New York, 1991), an especially well written and well argued survey; John Blum, Years of Discord: American Politics and Society, 1961–1974 (New York, 1991); John Diggins, The Proud Decades: America in War and Peace, 1941–1960 (New York, 1988); Steve Fraser and Gary Gerstle, eds., The Rise and Fall of the New Deal Order , 1930–1980 (Princeton, 1989), a collection of articles focusing on labor and politics; Godfrey Hodgson, America in Our Time (Garden City, N.Y., 1976); William Leuchtenburg, In the Shadow ofF.D.R.: From Harry Truman to Ronald Reagan (Ithaca, 1983); Leuchtenburg, A Troubled Feast: American Society since 1945 (Boston, 1973); Alonzo Hamby, Liberalism and Its Challengers: From F.D.R. to Bush (New York, 1992), a book of informed essays on major political figures; Marty Jezer, The Dark Ages: Life in the United States,