How Did The Dramatic Change In The 1920's

During the 1920’s there was a dramatic change in social and political views. The 1920’s was a period known as the “Roaring Twenties” because of rapidly changing lifestyles, financial excess, and the rapid growth of technology. Movies and radio seemed to have a major impact and influenced how people dressed, thought and behaved. However, this change did not go well with some Americans. Many Americans were not happy with the new “secular and commercial culture” and feared “ethnic and racial diversity of American cities”. (Foner781)
Italian immigrants and anarchists, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, were accused of robbing a factory in Massachusetts and murdering the security guard. Very little evidence indicated that it was these men who committed the crime. Authorities never found the money nor did the fingerprints match the

weapon that was allegedly used for the murder. Sacco and Vanzetti had a lengthy trial and it attracted international attention. Protests broke out because of their awaiting execution. Both men were sentenced to die and on August 23, 1927 they were executed on the electric chair. The Sacco-Vanzetti case brought light to some of the “fault lines” that America had. (Foner780)
The generation of young women in the 1920’s known as the “flappers “were liberated and rose as a lifestyle.

Many women cut their hair in a bob, wore short skirts, drank and smoked and said to do things that a traditional woman wouldn’t do. A number of women started using birth control, which allowed them to have sexual freedom and lowered the amount of unwanted pregnancies. Woman became a “marketing device” to sell things. Women that were married also wanted liberation but in a different way. They looked for freedom from the “confines of the home”, so they used technology, like the washing machine and the vacuum to help reduce their labor. (Foner788)
The Fundamentalism movement was started by evangelical Protestants who felt threatened by the drop of traditional values. The fundamentalist wanted to bring back old morals and revive protestant values. They also supported the prohibition, which reduced the amount of people under the influence on the streets. Some people during the prohibition era made lots of money owning illegal “speakeasies” and it also created widespread corruption as police men to bribes to look the other way.

(Foner801)
John Scopes was a science teacher in Tennessee who was arrested for violating the state law that banned the teaching of evolution. The “Scopes trial” or the “Monkey Trial” as it was known mirrored the lasting tension between “two Americans definitions of freedom”. The trial was held in 1925, with one side which was Christians upholding the Tennessee law and the other side which was Scopes side, upholding the belief that men evolved from apes. William Jennings Bryan was the lawyer on the prosecution side and Clarence Darrow defended Scopes. Clarence called Bryan to the stand and started questioning him and it became a fight between science and Christianity. Bryan was ridiculed by Darrow asking him “ignorant and contradictory statements” to “amuse the crowd”. Scopes was found guilty but the verdict was later overturned. (Foner802)
Harlem, New York because famous for being “the capital of black America”. White people visited dance halls and Jazz clubs in Harlem in search for a new adventure. The Harlem Renaissance emergence was a cultural, artistic and social outburst that happened in Harlem. There were a lot of activist and poets during this era voicing out their thoughts.
The negative opinion native-born Americans had towards immigration was in part due to postwar urbanization. In the end the Roaring 1920’s had a decade of exciting social changes and profound cultural conflicts.