The Truman Presidency

468 Pages·1991·7.82 MB·English

by  Michael James Lacey

WOODROW WILSON CENTER SERIES
The Truman presidency

The Truman presidency
Edited by
MICHAEL J. LACEY
WOODROW WILSON INTERNATIONAL CENTER
FOR SCHOLARS
AND
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Cambridge
New York Port Chester Melbourne Sydney
Published by the Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge
The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 1RP
40 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011, USA
10 Stamford Road, Oakleigh, Melbourne 3166, Australia
© Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars 1989
First published 1989
Reprinted 1990
First paperback edition 1991
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The Truman presidency / edited by Michael J. Lacey.
p. cm. - (Woodrow Wilson Center series)
Papers presented at a symposium at the Wilson Center, Sept. 1984
organized by the Center's Program on American Society and Politics
and the staff of the National Museum of American History of the
Smithsonian Institution.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-521-37559-2 (Cambridge University Press)
1. United States - Politics and government - 1945-1953 - Congresses.
2. United States - Foreign relations - 1945-1953 - Congresses.
3. Truman, Harry S., 1884-1972 - Congresses. I. Lacey, Michael
James. II. Program on American Society and Politics (Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars) III. National Museum of American
History (U.S.) IV. Series.
E813.T74 1989
973.918-dc20 89-1045
CIP
British Library Cataloging in Publication Data
The Truman presidency. - (Woodrow Wilson Center
series)
1. United States. Political events 1945-1953
I. Lacey, Michael J. II. Series
973.918
ISBN 0-521-37559-2 hardback
ISBN 0-521-40773-7 paperback
Transferred to digital printing 2003
WOODROW WILSON INTERNATIONAL CENTER
FOR SCHOLARS
BOARD OF TRUSTEES
William J. Baroody, Jr., Chairman; Dwayne O. Andreas, Vice Chairman; Robert McC.
Adams; James A. Baker III; Theodore C. Barreaux; James H. Billington; Lynne V. Cheney;
Gertrude Himmelfarb; Max M. Kampelman; J. Willard Marriott, Jr.; John S. Reed; Robert
Tuttle; Don W. Wilson
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Dedicated
to
the memory of
Charles S. Murphy
(1909-1983)
Contents
Acknowledgments page ix
Introduction and summary: The Truman era in
retrospect Michael J. Lacey 1
1 The mind and character of Harry S. Truman
Alonzo L. Hamby 19
Part I. Domestic politics and issues
2 Forging America's postwar order: domestic politics
and political economy in the age of Truman
Robert Griffith 57
3 Attitudes toward industry in the Truman
administration: the macroeconomic origins
of microeconomic policy Craufurd D. Goodwin 89
4 Labor in the Truman era: origins of the "private
welfare state" Nelson Lichtenstein 128
5 Postwar American society: dissent and social reform
William H. Chafe 156
6 "Some sort of peace": President Truman, the
American people, and the atomic bomb
Paul Boyer 174
vn
viii Contents
Part II. Foreign policy and national defense
7 The national security state reconsidered: Truman and
economic containment, 1945-1950
Robert A. Pollard 205
8 The insecurities of victory: the United States and
the perception of the Soviet threat after World
War II John Lewis Gaddis 235
9 Alliance and autonomy: European identity and U.S.
foreign policy objectives in the Truman years
Charles S. Maier 273
10 U.S. policy in the Near East: the triumphs and
tribulations of the Truman administration
Bruce R. Kuniholm 299
11 Toward a post-colonial order: Truman administration
policies toward South and Southeast Asia
Robert]. McMahon 339
12 Occupied Japan and the cold war in Asia
John W. Dower 366
13 The Truman administration and the Korean War
Barton J. Bernstein 410
About the authors 445
Index 447
Acknowledgments
This volume is the result of a scholarly symposium organized by the
Woodrow Wilson Center's Program on American Society and Politics
and the staff of the National Museum of American History of the Smith-
sonian Institution. Thanks are due first to the authors whose work ap-
pears in the pages that follow, not merely for their scholarly acumen, but
for their patience and good humor in suffering publication delays. The
editor wishes to thank formally the members of the planning committee
for the symposium, who helped to sort out themes, topics, and possibili-
ties for participation and did so much to bring the conference to fruition:
Michael Beschloss, Robert Donovan, John Gaddis, Robert Griffith, and
particularly Robert Pollard.
The symposium project was undertaken at the urging of the Truman
Centennial Committee, established in 1983 to coordinate the activities
held in observance of the one-hundredth anniversary of Harry Truman's
birth. We are especially grateful to the committee's chairman, Clark M.
Clifford, and his colleagues, particularly the late Charles S. Murphy (to
whose memory the volume is dedicated), George M. Elsey, Francis Hel-
ler, Philleo Nash, Elmer B. Staats, David Stowe, Benedict Zobrist, and
the late Leon Keyserling, for their advice, encouragement, and support.
The critics and commentators at the conference sessions also made im-
portant contributions to the arguments developed; this group included
Richard J. Barnet, Robert Collins, Bruce Cummings, Steven Fraser, Louis
Galambos, James Gilbert, Gary Hess, Michael Hogan, Vojtech Mastny,
Aaron D. Miller, Howard Schonberger, Harvard Sitkoff, Ronald Steel,
and Nancy Tucker. And a final word of thanks is in order for Sam Hughes,
former under secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, for his guidance
in getting everything arranged and under way.
IX