Domestic containment in post–World War II America

Domestic containment was the domestic manifestation of the foreign policy of containment, articulated in 1947 by Foreign Service officer George F. Kennan. When applied to a domestic context, containment produced a suppression of all social and cultural elements deemed subversive and threatening to national security because of their deviation from the state-supported ideal.

Foreign Policy: Kennan and the Truman doctrine

The principle of containment, enunciated by Kennan, stated “The main element of any United States policy toward the Soviet Union must be that of a long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies.” ^[1] It was then incorporated into the Truman Doctrine, which stated that "the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces."^[2] The authoritarian forces mentioned referred to the communist ideology promoted by the Soviet Union and to internal communist supporters in all countries.

Post–World War II domestic containment

When applied to the United States on the domestic level, containment meant: conformity with the dominant white ideal of a white, suburban, nuclear family with a heterosexual couple - a white-collar male breadwinner and a housewife - and docile children who fit traditional gender roles.

The post–World War II baby boom significantly increased the number of families in the U.S., as the birth rate spiked between 1946 and 1964^[3] making this ideal relevant to a large proportion of the population.

Traditional explanations for the rise of this postwar family ideal focus on economic means: The GI bill increased soldiers' access to college education, greatly expanding college enrollment. In 1947, veterans accounted for 49 percent of college admissions.^[4] The bill also increased access to low-interest home loans contributing to a large increase in home ownership: from 1944–1952, the Veterans Administration “supported nearly 2.4 million home loans for World War II veterans.”^[4] However, closer examination shows that many people were left out of this new economic prosperity. Minorities who did not fit the ideal (including racial minorities, feminists, and homosexuals) were suppressed, unable to assert autonomy, and therefore contained.

The GI Bill’s provisions for increased college enrollment disproportionately benefited white men because of college segregation. African American men were eligible for the home loans but many were prevented from buying houses in suburban areas because of redlining and other segregation techniques.

Other members of society who were excluded from the postwar ideal of middle-class employment and home ownership included, among others, women and Asians. Women who had worked in factories to support the economy during World War II were pressured to leave the workforce and become housewives. Japanese people released from the World War II internment camps returned home to find their property confiscated.

Proponents of domestic containment^[who?] invoked the threat of communism to justify suppressing all elements of society that didn’t meet their vision of a stable family. These elements were deemed subversive and linked to communism as a threat to national security.

Methods of domestic containment

• Sexuality: White women were contained to fit a feminine, yet not overtly sexual image. Tight clothes were prescribed for women, including the bikini, named after the Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, site of nuclear weapon testing.^[5] Additionally, homosexuals were viewed as amoral and more susceptible to irreligious communism. The government purged gay people during the era of McCarthyism, despite a dearth of evidence implicating them as spies.

• Education and employment: White women were discouraged from pursuing higher education and careers. Black women, on the other hand, continued to be confined to low-paying jobs, such as domestic servants who worked for white families. White women often actively contained their black servants by acting like matriarchs over them.^[6]

• Space:The suburbs were the ideal home location. The white woman’s domain was the kitchen.

• Pop culture: Television encouraged the promotion of the white ideal through patriarchal family shows like Father Knows Best. ^[7]

• Gendering the children:Sociologists such as Dr. Benjamin Spock encouraged girls to play with dolls and emulate their mothers. They also promoted the preparation of boys for manhood by encouraging them to play with toy vehicles and role-play policemen or firemen.^[8]

Historical impact on the nonviolent civil rights movement

Domestic containment prevented minorities who didn't fit the white ideal from asserting meaningful autonomy throughout the 1940s and 1950s. They would lack a postwar voice on the national stage until the rise of the nonviolent civil rights movement in the late 1950s. However, the culture of domestic containment continued to impact and constrain the arguments and activism of this movement.

Containment of nonviolent civil rights arguments: The non-violent civil rights movement did not reject the ideal of the suburban, educated, home-owning family. It simply agitated for the inclusion of African Americans in this ideal. It also couched its rhetoric in terms of pro-American rights of integration into the white ideal, rather than international notions of economic or civil equality that could have been linked to the equality notions within communism. This avoidance of any arguments that could have been associated with communism also forced the non-violent movement to dissociate itself from global decolonization efforts, such as Patrice Lumumba’s struggle in the Belgian Congo.

Examples of the containment of nonviolent civil rights activism:

• Mamie Till Bradley was the mother of Emmett Till, a fourteen year-old black boy who was brutally murdered in Mississippi in 1955 for allegedly whistling at a white woman. Mamie decided to have an open-casket funeral for Emmett to make public the mutilation his killers had inflicted upon him. Following the acquittal of Emmett’s alleged murderers (who later confessed to the crime), Mamie toured the country giving speeches condemning the killing and agitating for justice to be served so that such a racist killing would not happen again. Her eloquence attracted large crowds and help from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which produced advertisements in the New York Times supporting her. ^[9] However, in order to appeal to the prevailing culture of domestic containment, she portrayed herself as a perfect mother who cared about her child, rather than as a political activist seeking equality. When she appealed to the NAACP for financial assistance, the organization withdrew its support of her and criticized her for overstepping her bounds. She was thus contained by a civil rights organization that accepted the domestic containment ideal of a woman who was a mother, not a paid activist (even if the financial assistance asked for was simply to cover her costs, not make an income).

• Pauli Murray was a nonviolent Civil Rights activist and member of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). In 1938, she campaigned to enter the all-white University of North Carolina Law School. She was initially supported by the NAACP, but the organization later withdrew its support, citing her aggressiveness, which did not fit with the domestic containment ideal of an obedient woman. In 1944, she applied to Harvard Law School and was initially awarded a fellowship. However, after the award was announced, Harvard rejected her because of her gender.^[10] Thus, a second educational institution rejected her because she didn’t fit the patriarchal domestic containment model. She was also criticized throughout her career for having briefly been a member of the Communist Party in the 1930s.

References

1. ^ State Department, 1947: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/cwr/17601.htm
2. ^ (State Department, 1947: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/cwr/82210.htm)
3. ^ http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005067.html
4. ^ ^{a b} http://www.gibill.va.gov/GI_Bill_Info/history.htm
5. ^ http://inventors.about.com/od/bstartinventions/a/Bikini.htm
6. ^ Anne Moody, Coming of Age in Mississippi (New York: Dell Publishing, 1968): 117
7. ^ http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/F/htmlF/familyontel/familyontel.htm
8. ^ http://proxy.arts.uci.edu/~nideffer/Tvc/section1/05.Tvc.v9.sect1.Gomes.html
9. ^ http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/till/peopleevents/p_parents.html
10. ^ http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAmurrayA.htm