This Teaching Guide is part of a series. Each of the four total teaching guides speaks to one aspect of the history of free speech. Although they work together to tell different parts of this history, it is not necessary to teach all of the guides or to teach them in a certain order. Each guide is a self-contained lesson.
(A PDF version of this teaching guide is also available for download-see left) 

Other guides in the series:
Free Speech Teaching Guide 1: The Birth of the Modern First Amendment: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind
Free Speech Teaching Guide 2: Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969): Defining and Arguing Hate Speech 
Free Speech Teaching Guide 3: The Problem of National Security Secrets

"Male Immigrants at Ellis Island," Library of Congress

Recommended for:

• 11th Grade US History
• 12th Grade US History
• Undergraduate History

Table of Contents

Guide Introduction:
This introduction briefly previews the topics included in this guide that spans the twentieth century and ends with a 1972 Supreme Court Case.

Classroom Activities
Exercise 1: "The unrestricted dumping-ground" (1903). A guided analysis of a 1903 political cartoon with annotations and questions. Why was immigration a heated debate in the early twentieth century?
Exercise 2: Who gets a Visa? A close reading of an excerpted 1984 article with guiding questions, notes, and class discussion options. Why deny visas?
Optional Exercise: Visa Waivers. Ask students to consider the more complicated reality of the visa law. How did waivers work and did they undermine political exclusion?

Framing Essay
Scholarly Context: How do visa laws and the First Amendment connect? An introduction to the Mandel Supreme Court case.
Annotated Decision: Notes on the Mandel SCOTUS decision for context or to help guide a close reading.
Key Takeaways: Concluding connections between immigration law and free speech law and prompts for class discussion.

Guide Introduction

        Throughout the 20th century, the U.S. government has denied visas to individuals because of their politics: anarchists in the early 20th century, communists in the Cold War, those it deemed advocates of terrorism in the 1990s and early 2000s. In the first half of 2025, the Second Trump Administration began seeking to deny visas to students and others engaged in pro-Palestinian advocacy during the war in Gaza.
        To be denied a visa means either that you can’t enter the country, or that you can be deported. Governments claim that this use of the visa regulations is simply a part of their control over immigration policy – they have a right to determine who can enter the country. Critics and civil liberties activists argue that it is a form of censorship, one that should be barred by the First Amendment. The relationship between visa laws and free speech was most closely examined in a 1972 case Mandel v. Kleindeinst. The case is also significant because it focused on a neglected aspect of the right to free speech – not the rights of the speakers to say what they want, but the rights of listeners and audiences to hear what they want.
        This guide traces the history of ideological visa denial to explore the intersection between immigration law and the right to free speech. It includes:

1.  An overview of the history of visa denial in early 20th century, which allows students to assess historical fears of radical immigrants through the close reading of a political cartoon.
2. A discussion of the denial of visas to communists and alleged radicals in the Cold War, through a classroom exercise and discussion of an excerpted newspaper article.
3. An assessment of the role of the First Amendment in challenging visa restrictions through a close reading of a Supreme Court decision in 1972.

Classroom Exercise I: "the unrestricted dumping-ground" (1903)

Contents:
Overview
Annotated Cartoon
Questions for Students & Extended Context

Overview:
       The first efforts to exclude radicals from the United States came in 1903, when Congress passed a law barring anarchists from entering the country. This was a response to the assassination of President McKinley in 1901, which played into widespread anxieties that radical ideologies and crime were being brought to the country by immigrants. This 1903 cartoon captures the mood. The following pages include my annotations, as well as questions I use.

1. Have students examine the cartoon individually or in groups.
2. Invite students to share what they notice and ask more specific questions to guide conversation. This should mimic a close reading.

For the Printable Image See: linked source

Image Source Here

Annotations:

• McKinley assassination
  • McKinley (or McKinley’s ghost) is depicted in the top-left.
  • Leon Czolgosz, the gunman, was born in Detroit, but was the child of immigrants.
  • The cartoon, however, suggests the threat of anarchism is coming from immigrants, a widespread assumption at the time. “There is no such thing as an American anarchist,” said one newspaper column.
• Both the container label “direct from the slums of Europe daily” and the title of the cartoon advocate for immigration restriction.
• Depiction of Immigrants
  • McKinley and Uncle Sam are depicted as white, compared to the darker-skinned immigrants. At the time, most concern was about immigration from the south and east of Europe – groups that would later be considered white, but which were then treated as distinct races.
  • Immigrants are drawn to be animalistic, communicating an idea that they were less human and more threatening than white Americans.
• Politics & crime:
  • Three migrants at the bottom are labeled “socialist,” “anarchist,” and “mafia,” associating socialists and anarchists with crime. The socialist carries a gun labelled “murder;” the anarchist a knife labelled “assassination,” further associating these political ideologies with violence.
  • There were radical leftists committed to political violence at the time. One wing of the anarchist movement, for instance, engaged in what it called “propaganda by the deed” – symbolic acts of political violence. Between 1880 and 1910, anarchists assassinated heads of state in Austria, Italy, Greece, France, Spain, Russia (twice), and Portugal – as well as McKinley in the U.S.
  • While many radical leftists rejected political violence, this cartoon suggests they were all criminals.

By the early Cold War, the bar on anarchists entering the country remained, and had been expanded to include Communists and advocates of communist revolution. The visa had also become a more powerful bureaucratic instrument. During World War I, for the first time the U.S. began requiring all visitors to the U.S. to receive a visa, which allowed a new degree of oversight and examination of applicants. A new Visa Division was created in the State Department to do this work.

Questions for Students:

1. How are immigrants depicted?
2. What is this cartoon arguing?
3. Would immigration restriction be a useful remedy to the problems revealed by McKinley’s Assassination? What would have to be true for it to be effective for this purpose? What other remedies might be available?

Classroom Exercise II: Who gets a Visa?

Contents:
Overview
Excerpted Newspaper Article
Guiding Questions, Notes, & Class Discussion

Overview:
       A close reading of a later news article brings the topic of immigration and citizenship closer to the modern day for students. This exercise is centered around an excerpted 1984 newspaper article that discusses some individuals who were denied visas as well as efforts to reform the law. The article, like the cartoon in exercise 1, thus reveals some of the political dynamics involved.
        The next page includes some reading questions (as well as additional notes I might add), followed by a question for in-class discussion.

Excerpted Newspaper Article:
Kristin Helmore, “Would William Shakespeare get a Visa?” Christian Science Monitor, May 30, 1984.
       WALK into any bookstore in the United States and the works of Nobel Prize-winners Gabriel Garcia Marquez of Colombia and Pablo Neruda of Chile will be easily available. Anyone who wants to can buy Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes's works or those of Italian writers Alberto Moravia and Dario Fo. And the titles of books by English novelist Graham Greene are almost household words in this country. Yet each of these acclaimed writers, and many others as well, has on at least one occasion been denied an entry visa to visit the United States.
        The law responsible for this policy is a section of the McCarran-Walter Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, which some people would like to change. A bill has been introduced in Congress to do just that.
        ''Section 28,'' as it is called, empowers consular officials to refuse non-immigrant visas to foreigners who are or have been members of ''communist'' or ''anarchist'' organizations, as well as those who merely ''write, publish . . . circulate, display, or distribute . . . any written or printed matter advocating or teaching opposition to all organized government.'...
       The exclusion of writers from the US on ideological grounds can take place for a number of specific reasons. According to data collected by PEN, an international association of writers with offices in 55 countries, Gabriel Garcia Marquez was denied entry to the US from 1963 to '71 because of his affiliation with the leftist news agency La Prensa. Since that time, he has been granted entry only on presentation of a formal letter inviting him to a specific event. Last month, Mr. Garcia Marquez was denied entry into the US to speak at a meeting in New York on US policies in Latin America. Finally, in late April, he was granted a multiple-entry visa for one year.
        Pablo Neruda, the late Chilean poet and diplomat, was denied entry on the basis of his membership in the Chilean Communist Party. This ruling was waived on two occasions, in 1966 and '72, as a result of petitions put forward by PEN. ...
       Since 1961, Carlos Fuentes, the Mexican author and politician (who virtually grew up in Washington where his father was Mexican ambassador), has either been denied a visa to the US or issued restricted visas, even though he has been invited on numerous occasions to make public appearances under the auspices of respected institutions. He has received an honorary degree from Harvard University and was recently a visiting scholar at Princeton University. ...
        ''It's a scandal and a hateful thing for a democracy to perpetuate this kind of exclusionary policy,'' [novelist William] Styron said. ''It allows the United States to be branded as a bigoted nation filled with hysteria about communism.'
        Both Arthur Miller and John Irving raised the specter of McCarthyism. ''I doubt strongly that this law could have been passed before 1952, the wildest time of McCarthyism . . . but it's hung on the books because most people aren't aware of it,'' Mr. Miller said.
        ''I hope it's clear that we would improve our national character by ridding ourselves of these vestiges of McCarthyism which shame us today,'' Mr. Irving said.
        Carolyn Forche remarked, ''I am puzzled as to why my government is afraid of a free exchange of ideas. I would hope that my country and its institutions are strong enough to endure freedom of expression.' ...
        Support for the existing law was recently expressed on ABC's ''Nightline'' by Roy Cohn, counsel in the early 1950s to the Senate's Permanent Investigations Subcommittee headed by the late Joseph R. McCarthy: ''This law is aimed at people who present a threat to national security. Under various circumstances they should not be let in. They have access to courts where their visa denial can be overruled.' ….
        Opposition to Section 28 of the McCarran-Walter Act has a long history. In 1952, President Harry S. Truman vetoed the act, remarking, ''Seldom has a bill exhibited the distrust evidenced here for aliens and citizens alike.'
        Congress overrode Mr. Truman's veto."

Guiding Questions, Notes & Class Discussion:

1. Who are some individuals who have been denied visas?
   1. Besides those named in the article, some famous individuals (though perhaps not famous to students today) include Charlie Chaplin, Pablo Picasso, Dorris Lessing, Nazim Hikmet, Czeslaw Milosz, C.L.R. James.
2. What law was used to deny their visas?
   1. The 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act consolidated all previous immigration laws – including the Anarchist Exclusion Act of 1903 and an Internal Security Act of 1950.
   2. It was passed over Truman’s veto – a place to discuss the veto power with students if you think appropriate.
3. Why do civil liberties groups want to reform the law?
   1. Beyond discussions of the impact of the law on the individuals involved, I make sure to draw student attention to William Styron’s argument that the law makes America look bigoted and intolerant.
4. Why does Roy Cohn say we need such a law?
   1. How does this perspective complicate or affirm students’ thoughts on this debate?

Class Discussion:

• Do students think denying visas under this law is a good or a bad thing?
• Do they agree that there are national security grounds under which someone should be denied entry to the country? Do those grounds extend to political beliefs?
  • If you have used the other Free Speech Teaching Guides that cover Schenk v. US and Brandenburg v. Ohio, this is an opportunity to discuss what "harm" the law is intended to prevent.

Optional Exercise: Visa Waivers

        The visa law had a waiver process. If you were denied a visa because you were a member of a communist party, the Attorney-General could issue a “waiver” – letting you into the country just this time.

If students are opposed to the law, you can ask them if this waiver process is enough to satisfy them?

        There was some dispute over how frequently this process was delayed, and how many waivers were granted. But many were granted waivers. However, an additional concern was that the Attorney-General could attach conditions to the waiver – saying visitors could not travel to certain areas, or engage in certain types of activities. (we will see an example of these conditions in the Mandel case).

Framing Essay

Scholarly Context:
       How did these visa laws intersect with the First Amendment? They are clearly a form of punishment for political speech. As early as 1903, an anarchist being deported under the anarchist exclusion law claimed that his First Amendment rights were being violated. The Supreme Court ruled that foreigners could not claim First Amendment rights to stay in the country. As we discussed in the guide, Schenk v. U.S. (1919): The Birth of the Modern First Amendment, this was typical of the narrow way that the Supreme Court protected First Amendment rights before the mid-twentieth century. And in 1945, in a case concerning an attempt to deport an Australian labor leader, the Supreme Court said that noncitizens in the U.S. have the same First Amendment rights as citizens. Of course, in the early 1950s, American citizens didn’t have the right to advocate for Communism, and so many communists were deported in the McCarthy period, just as many Americans citizens were jailed. Today, the standards would be different.

Find the text of the First Amendment Here

       But what about the rights of the foreigner to enter the country? Here, courts have rejected the notion that foreigners can claim a First Amendment right to come into the U.S. if the U.S. has a law that would exclude them. The Supreme Court has ruled that the right to determine who can and can’t enter the country is what it calls the “Plenary Power” – part of what it means to be a government of a nation-state is the right to choose who can enter the country, and no court can interfere with those decisions.
        That has meant that foreigners can’t claim a First Amendment right to enter the country (they can claim such a right if they are being deported after entering, though the law is complex in this area.) But in the late 1960s, a group of university professors tried a different strategy to challenge the visa laws. They had invited Ernest Mandel, a Belgian Marxist theorist, to come to their campuses to give talks and engage in debates. Mandel was denied a visa because he advocated world communism.

Note (if you discussed the waiver program earlier):
       Mandel had been given waivers to enter the country in 1962 and 1968. But in 1969 he was denied a waiver. This was because 1) in 1968 he spoke at more universities than his waiver granted, and 2) after one of these talks, students auctioned posters to send money to French protestors – which violated a condition attached to Mandel’s waiver that he not speak at events where funds were raised for political causes. Mandel had not been told that these conditions were attached to his waiver. This can be a place to return to your discussion of the waiver program, to see if these details change or reinforce students’ earlier attitudes.

Annotated Decision:
       Mandel, as a foreigner, couldn’t claim his First Amendment rights were violated by his exclusion from the country. But the university professors argued that their rights were violated by his exclusion from the country – they wanted to listen to him, to talk to him, to meet with him. A lower court agreed with them, ruling that Mandel’s exclusion violated the First Amendment. The government appealed to the Supreme Court, which ruled 6-3 that Mandel’s exclusion was constitutional. Here’s what the Supreme Court said, along with some notes I use to teach the decision:

The decision text:
"The case…comes down to the narrow issue whether the First Amendment confers upon the appellee professors, because they wish to hear, speak, and debate with Mandel in person, the ability to determine that Mandel should be permitted to enter the country or, in other words, to compel the Attorney General to allow Mandel's admission. ….
The Government also suggests that the First Amendment is inapplicable because appellees have free access to Mandel's ideas through his books and speeches, and because 'technological developments,' such as tapes or telephone hook-ups, readily supplant his physical presence. This argument overlooks what may be particular qualities inherent in sustained, face-to-face debate, discussion and questioning. While alternative means of access to Mandel's ideas might be a relevant factor were we called upon to balance First Amendment rights against governmental regulatory interests—a balance we find unnecessary here in light of the discussion that follows in Part V—we are loath to hold on this record that existence of other alternatives extinguishes altogether any constitutional interest on the part of the appellees in this particular form of access."
Recognition that First Amendment rights are implicated, however, is not dispositive of our inquiry here. In accord with ancient principles of the international law of nation-states, the Court in The Chinese Exclusion Case 1889, and in Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893), held broadly…that the power to exclude aliens is 'inherent in sovereignty, necessary for maintaining normal international relations and defending the country against foreign encroachments and dangers—a power to be exercised exclusively by the political branches of government.' ...

In summary, plenary congressional power to make policies and rules for exclusion of aliens has long been firmly established. In the case of an alien excludable under § 212(a)(28), Congress has delegated conditional exercise of this power to the Executive. We hold that when the Executive exercises this power negatively on the basis of a facially legitimate and bona fide reason, the courts will neither look behind the exercise of that discretion, nor test it by balancing its justification against the First Amendment interests of those who seek personal communication with the applicant. What First Amendment or other grounds may be available for attacking exercise of discretion for which no justification whatsoever is advanced is a question we neither address or decide in this case.”

Annotations:

• ["This argument overlooks what may be particular qualities inherent in sustained, face-to-face debate, discussion and questioning."]
  • The Government was claiming that the professors could speak to Mandel just as easily by telephone, and so his presence was not necessary. The court is skeptical of this claim.
    • In the era of zoom, do students think there is any benefit to in-person conversation? or is online discussion good enough?
• ["Recognition that First Amendment rights are implicated..."]
  • The Supreme Court concedes here that there is a First Amendment right to hear Mandel. There are a number of other cases in the period which emphasize that the right to speak matters not for the speaker, but for the audience - that the First Amendment is important for its role in preserving a broader culture of debate and exchange.
  • Many students will think only about the rights of the speaker, so this is an important place to slow down and demonstrate how many more rights are involved.
• ["The Chinese Exclusion Case 1889, and in Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893)..."]
  • These are important late nineteenth century cases which established the Plenary Power. Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882, barring Chinese entry to the country. In these legal cases, courts said that they could not overrule political decisions made by Congress as to who could enter the country.
• ["facially legitimate and bona fide reason..."]
  • This is a very deferential standard. In other first amendment cases, the Supreme Court has carefully scrutinized the government's rationale for a law, to make sure it isn't a cover for political discrimination. But here, the court says explicitly that if the government offers a justification that seems reasonable, the courts will not look any closer, or consider the First Amendment.
  • In dissent, Justice Marshall was very critical of this approach:
    • "I do not understand the source of this unusual standard. Merely 'legitimate' governmental interests cannot override constitutional rights. Moreover, the majority demands only 'facial' legitimacy and good faith, by which it means that this Court will never 'look behind' any reason the Attorney General gives. No citation is given for this kind of unprecedented deference to the Executive nor can I imagine (nor am I told) the slightest justification for such a rule."
• ["What First Amendment or other grounds may be available for attacking exercise of..."]
  • This is an ambiguous final sentence, which can be used to help students understand the difficulty in working out how much precedent a given case is setting.
  • This sentence seems to leave open the possibility that there are some instances of visa denial which would raise First Amendment concerns - those in "which no justification whatsoever is advanced." But under what circumstances would a justification fail to be "facially legitimate and bona fide"?
  • The Court has never revisited the visa denial process, so the meaning of these sentences remains unresolved.

Key Takeaways:

• Visa denial is at the crossroads of two discrete fields of the law: immigration law and free speech law.
  • In immigration law, courts have been very deferential to the power of the government to decide who can enter the country; in free speech law, courts have been very skeptical of government claims that it needs to regulate debate and discussion.

Do students think cases like Mandel’s – or more recent cases, if there have been some in the news – are better treated as First Amendment or immigration cases? Or do they think that these two areas of the law should be combined?

• This can be an interesting place to leave the class discussion – asking students both to consider their own values in this complex area, and also to show them how the answers to legal questions are often shaped by the ways that courts and lawyers sort them into different doctrinal domains.

Introduction: How to Use this Guide

Organization

• Sources are sorted into four thematic sections, arranged chronologically.
• Each section begins with an overview and index of sources.
• Primary sources are curated alongside questions, videos, and podcasts to help contextualize each source.

Links

• Many sources are linked to their hosting websites (external to this site).

Environmentalism in the Progressive Era & WWI (c. 1890-1920)

Overview

The primary source documents and videos in this section illustrate the growing environmental ethos evident in the early twentieth century, from the Progressive Era through Wold War I.

The Progressive Era, spanning roughly from 1890-1920, can be understood as a period of reform movements formed in response to rapid industrialization, urbanization, and commercialization. Among these reform movements were two early environmental movements known as preservationism and conservationism. Preservationists believed that natural landscapes should be left exactly as they were, and conservationists sought to maintain natural resources in order for them to be best used and enjoyed. John Muir was known as the most prominent preservationist, whereas Gifford Pinchot was known as the most prominent conservationist.

This growing environmental ethos continued into World War I, as Americans conserved and rationed resources in order to support the war effort. Through their participation in garden clubs and local victory gardens, American women and children on the home front used agricultural practices to support soldiers abroad.

The sources in this section exemplify the many perspectives among Americans fostering connections to the environment in the early twentieth century.

Sources

• Essay: Gifford Pinchot, 1890 (Excerpt) 
  • 6-12 Video: Mira Lloyd Dock: A Beautiful Crusade
• Legislative Summary of the Bill to Establish the National Park Service, 1916
  • 6-12 Video: Brigadier General Charles Young
• “Everybody Plant a Garden,” Richmond Times-Dispatch, April 22, 1917
• “Yule Exhibits in Portsmouth,” Virginian-Pilot, December 11, 1941
• Will you have a part in Victory? 1918 Poster
• The Gardens of Victory, Poster
  • Victory Gardens Video

Excerpt: Gifford Pincho Essay, 1890

Link: https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/environmental-preservation-in-the-progressive-era/sources/919

Background:

• Gifford Pinchot (1865-1946) was known as the “father of American forestry.”
• He was an influential Progressive Era conservationist who advocated for the protection of natural resources in the United States.
• This 1908 Essay discusses issues of deforestation, the over-extraction of coal and other minerals, and the negative effects of monopolies on natural resources.
• Pinchot calls for a “New Point of View” regarding the environment, and he appeals to doing so for future generations and the United States as a nation.

Discussion Questions: 

• Which natural resources do you think Pinchot is referring to?
• What might Pinchot mean by a “critical point” in history?
• In what ways might this relate to industrialization?

Extension Video:

Mira Lloyd Dock: A Beautiful Crusade (Link to Web)

Annotation/Discussion Questions:

• How might Dock’s experiences growing up in an industrializing city influenced her career trajectory?
• What were some of the environmental hazards
  Harrisburg faced due to industrialization?
• What were some of the argument Dock made for cleaning up Harrisburg? How might her trip to Europe have influenced her arguments?
• How might public parks have helped industrializing cities?
• How might Harrisburg’s city beautiful movement have influenced movements in other cities, as well as city parks in our own time?

1916 Congressional bill to establish the National Park Service & NPS Video

Link: https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/environmental-preservation-in-the-progressive-era/sources/913

Background:

• President Woodrow Wilson established the NPS
  into law through the 1916 “Organic Act.”
• Congress proposed a bill to establish the NPS in response to the growing national ethos toward conservation coming out of the Progressive Era.
• This Congressional report summarizes the bill,
  highlighting the utility behind the creation of the
  NPS under the Secretary of the Interior.

Annotation/Discussion Questions:

• In the first paragraph, the report summarizes the main purposes behind the foundation
  of the National Park Service. What are they?
• Which department will manage the NPS? Why do you think Progressive Era Americans wanted the federal government to oversee parks? How might this fit into broader Progressive Era reforms?
• How does Congress distinguish the difference between the National Parks and the National Forests?

Extension Video:

Brigadier General Charles Young Link: https://home.nps.gov/seki/learn/historyculture/young.htm

Background:

• First Black National Park Super Intendant of Sequoia National Park
• Prolific military career despite segregation of US armed forces

Link to Supplementary Lesson Plan, NPS: https://home.nps.gov/articles/000/-h-our-history-lesson-fit-for-service-colonel-charles-young-s-protest-ride.htm

"Everybody Plant a Garden," Richmond Times-Dispatch, April 22, 1917

Annotation:

• As a newspaper, this was intended for a wide audience and was published just weeks after the US declared war on Germany during WWI. Victory Gardens were encouraged as a way to help with food shortages and rations during the war. Gardening also gave people something to do and a way to participate that would ease anxieties about the war, food, and the threat of inflation.
• While Garden Clubs were primarily run by women, men and children were also encouraged to join so the whole family could be involved.
• War took millions of men away from their jobs which included agriculture and transportation. Imports of goods from other countries including fertilizer also slowed or stopped. With decreased home grown food and decreased imports of foreign food, shortages occurred  which caused increased prices and hoarding.
• The bank invested in the Garden Club in support of the war effort and the local economy.

Discussion Questions:

• Why might the Bank sponsor a Garden Club? For what reasons might the government have encouraged victory gardens?
• What benefits do you think victory gardens provided?
• What do you need to start a Victory Garden? Can everyone do it? (knowledge, tools)

"Yule Exhibits in Portsmouth," Virginian-Pilot, December 11, 1941

Annotation:

• As a newspaper, this was intended for a wide public audience. The date reveals that this Yule Exhibit was held the weekend after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
• A Federation of Garden Clubs through the County indicates that Garden club work was important to the government. Even on the local level, there was institutional support of the war effort.
• This exhibit attempted to make conservation interesting
  to a wide audience by connecting it to Christmas, and
  hoped to encourage families to reduce waste and decorate using recycled materials at home. Reducing
  waste was important during war time when money and
  resources were scarce.
• All of the club’s leaders were women which shows that
  conservation was seen as a “women’s activity.” Garden
  Clubs provided women leadership opportunities. Also note that they were all listed by their husbands’ names.
• Garden Clubs were often made exclusive to only wealthy
  white women. This article shows that in spite of
  segregation, Black women organized their own Garden
  Clubs and advocated for conservation.

Extension Videos:

Smithsonian Gardens: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtrlcLslK5w

Discussion Questions:

• How might Garden Clubs connect to politics?
• Why was gardening an “acceptable” way for women to become activists and professionals?
• What were gender roles of the time? How did this work stay within or reject them?

Will you have a part in Victory? 1918

Link: https://www.loc.gov/item/2002712327/

Annotation:

• This was published by the National War Garden Commission, a temporary department created to encourage gardening during WWI.
• Dressed in the American flag, this woman, beautiful and innocent looking, represents the country. She appears delicate and yet powerful, but ultimately worthy of
  protection. She walks with a purpose and sows seeds that presumably will allow the nation to win the war. This imagery is often used for America or American ideals (think Statue of Liberty). The image conjures an emotional attachment to the nation, but also inspires women to join her in the garden or farm fields.
• “Every Garden a Munition Plant” communicates that growing food is just as important as manufacturing guns and ammunition.

Discussion Questions:

• How is this similar to or different
  from other propaganda images?
• Why might America be depicted in
  this way? Where have we seen
  something similar?
• Why do you think the painting/image
  was made to look this way?
• Who is the audience for this image?

The Gardens of Victory

Gardens of Victory Video

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBg1ND5X3tA

Annotation:

• This film was made by the United States Office of Civil Defense. It shows the wartime need for vegetable gardens. It advertises that people can get instructions from the government on how to plant a successful garden. The film also says that people benefit from being in the sun and feeling involved in the war effort.
• In both of these sources, every member of the family is shown participating in the garden. The poster is not just focused on a wife or mother, in fact she is in the back. This family also does not appear to be wealthy which suggests Victory Gardening is for everyone.
• “Our food is fighting,” is similar to the WWI Poster that said “Every Garden, a Munitions Plant.” Food is seen as just important as military material and action.

Discussion Questions:

• Do you think this video would have been helpful to people? Why?
• What are some of the benefits victory gardens provided?
• How is this poster similar to or different from other propaganda images?
• Do you see any similarities or differences between these sources and victory garden material from WWI?

The Great Depression & The New Deal (c.1929-1945)

Overview

The sources in this section chronicle the environmental aspects of the Great Depression and the New Deal. This period can be studied for both its environmental disaster and federal initiatives toward conservation and reforestation.

In the early 1930s, as the Great Depression wreaked havoc on the economy, the Dust Bowl hit in the Great Plains and the eastern US. The Dust Bowl became known as the largest human caused environmental disaster in US history and is largely attributed to the poor use of agricultural lands as well that were intensified by a long drought in the region. The disaster would lead to mass migration from the Great Plains to Wester states, including California. Primary source photographs, an interview, and a PBS video illustrate the toll the Dust Bowl had on the environment and the people living there.

President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal ushered in a series of federally funded programs to alleviate financial burdens of the Great Depression, while also focusing on environmental projects. Notably, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) employed young men to work on conservation initiatives and reforestation projects. Their work would benefit the National Park Service, as well as State Parks around the country.

Sources

• The Dust Bowl & The Great Depression
  • Photo: Arthur Rothstein, “Abandoned farm in the dust bowl area, Oklahoma,” April 1936, Farm Security Administration.
  • Photo: Dorothea Lange, “Migrant Mother: Birth of an Icon,” Nipomo, 1936.
  • Video: A Man-Made Ecological Disaster
  • Interview with Flora Robertson, 1940
• Civilian Conservation Corps & the New Deal
  • Video: Zion National Park Ranger Minute
  • NPS, Civilian Conservation Corps Article
  • Video: Civilian Conservation Corps | Oregon Experience, Oregon Public Broadcasting

The Dust Bowl and the Great Depression

Background:

• In the early 1930s, extreme drought hit the Great Plains. For decades, farmers in the region had been over-plowing and depleting the soil through a lack of crop rotation.
• The drought, combined with high winds, caused massive
  dust storms that blew across the plains, further stripping topsoil.
• Along with environmental damage, the Dust Bowl caused
  further economic hardship and health issues.
• The Dust Bowl would also cause a mass migration of
  farmers out of states like Oklahoma, Texas, and Arkansas
  and to California as they searched for better opportunities.

Discussion Questions:

• Describe what you see in the photo.
• Read the caption:
  • Who took this photo and when?
  • Where is this located?
  • Why do you think this photo was taken?
  • Why might this photo have historical significance?
• Taken together, how do these two photographs provide different perspectives of the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression (eg. environmental, migration, childhood)

Extension Videos:

A Man-Made Ecological Disaster

Link: https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/ecological-disaster-ken-burns-dust-bowl/ken-burns-the-dust-bowl/

Interview with Flora Robertson, 1940

Link: https://history.iowa.gov/history/education/educator-resources/primary-source-sets/dust-bowl/interview-flora-robertson-about

Discussion Questions:

• When was this interview recorded and where is Flora located?
• How did Flora take to protect her from the dust storms?
• Why might Flora have waited to move to California?
• How does a personal account of the Dust Bowl add to your understanding of what happened?

Segregation and Jim Crow in the Environment

Overview

In the early twentieth century, Jim Crow segregation relegated Black Americans to separate and often unequal environmental spaces. In spite of this, Black Americans had robust relationships to the environment through recreation, and commercial or personal ownership.

The sources in this section highlight the specific ways outdoor spaces were segregated through law and social custom. The sources also reveal how Black Americans maintained connection to the outdoors despite the segregation they actively fought, creating spaces of joy and environmental connection for their communities. By exploring these not so distant stories, students will also be able to consider what effects of environmental segregation and racism are still present today.

Sources

• Ownership and Segregation of Beaches
  • Photo: “YWCA camp for girls. Highland Beach, Maryland,”
    1930, Scurlock Studio Records, Box 41, Archives Center,
    Smithsonian National Museum of American History.
  • Newspaper: “Police on Guard at Wade-In,” Chicago Tribune, July 9, 1961
  • Video: “Five Minute Histories: Carr’s Beach,” Baltimore Heritage, August 25, 2023.
• “African Americans and the Great Outdoors,” National Park Service, Digital Project and Map

Ownership and Segregation of Beaches

Annotation:

• Incorporated in 1922, Highland Beach was the first African American municipality in Maryland. It was also the first African American Summer Resort in the Country.
• Many very wealthy African Americans including Mary Church Terrell and Charles Douglass.
• In the late 1800s and early 1900s, most beaches and coastal properties were owned by Black people, particularly formerly enslaved folks and their descendants because the weather and sandy soil made the land less valuable. In the 20th century, predatory white land developers started trying to take these properties and monetize them as segregated beaches and resorts.
• The car and clothing hint at when this was taken, and reveal the presence of Black people in outdoor spaces, specifically beaches, long before desegregation.
• This photo is of a YWCA camp for girls. Recreation, specifically in the outdoors, was not limited to just boys.

Annotation:

• Wade-ins were just like sit-in protests happening at lunch counters during the civil rights movement. Instead of sitting down in restaurants, activists were visiting the beach and swimming in the ocean.
• Many of the beaches where wade-ins occurred, including Rainbow Beach, were not legally segregated, but were “segregated by custom,” meaning that only white people had been welcome there for many years, they were dangerous places for Black people to go.
• Wade-ins advocated for integration. Many communities ended up getting designated Black beaches rather than equal access to all beaches.
• The police are facing the group of protestors. This stance indicates that the protestors were seen as the threat of violence rather than the racist mob.
• Although no violence was reported, ten people were arrested for “unlawful assembly.” This charge is meant for people who enter a space illegally or who threaten public safety. Since there was no legal segregation of Rainbow Beach, neither one of these things was the case.

Discussion Questions:

• What or who do you see in these photos?
• When do you think these photos were taken?
• Why do you think the photos were taken?
• Did anything in the photos surprise you?
• What questions do you have for the photos?

The Environmental Movements of the 1960s and 1970s

Overview

By the 1960s, decades of industrialization, resource over-extraction, and use of harmful chemicals had taken a noticeable environmental toll. The sources in this section explore the environmental movements of the 1960s and 1970s and pieces of federal legislation passed in response to the growing popular movement to protect the environment.

By the early 1960s and 1970s, what had been a burgeoning environmental movement grew into the mainstream as activists and scholars alike noticed an intensifying environmental crisis. Some key issues included deforestation, air and water pollution, and species extinction. A few key moments in this growing environmental movement include: the fight against DDT, made popular by Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring; the first Earth Day in 1970; and the American Indian Movement’s March to Wounded Knee in 1973. Important pieces of legislation include the Wilderness Act (1964), Clean Air Act (1970), the Endangered Species Act (1973).

Sources

• "DDT is good for me-e-e," Advertisement, Time Magazine, June 30, 1947
  • Podcast: "DDT: The Britney Spears of Chemicals"
• Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, excerpts
  • American Experience: Rachel Carson Video
• Earth Day and March to Wounded Knee
  • Walter Cronkite, Earth Day CBS News Broadcast, April 22, 1970
  • "World Pilgrimage: Wounded Knee," Poster, April 22, 1970
  • Podcast: Throughline, "The Force of Nature"
  • Video: PBS, "The American Indian Movement and Wounded Knee"
• Environmental Movement: Legislation
  • Complete Text of the Wilderness Act (Teaching Version)
  • Endangered Species Act of 1973
  • Video: PBS Learning Media, "Birth of the Clean Air Act"
  • Video: US Fish and Wildlife Service, Endangered Species Act 101

"DDT is good for me-e-e," Advertisement, Time Magazine, June 30, 1947 

(see https://digital.sciencehistory.org/works/1831ck18w)

Background

• Created by the Penn Salt Chemicals company
• Published in Time Magazine, June 1947
• Touts the multiple uses and benefits of DDT for different audiences, including commercial farmers and in the home.
• Dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) was developed in the late nineteenth century, but became commercially available by the 1940s.
• The US military initially used DDT to stop the spread of diseases, like malaria, that spread through insects.
• DDT became commercially available in the 1940s as a pesticide that everyday Americans and famers could use to keep insects off of crops.
• Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring has been credited with exposing the harms of DDT on human, animal, and plant health.
• The movement against DDT can be seen as one of the main signifiers of the modern environmental movement, which had already started to take shape by the early 1960.

Discussion Questions

• What kind of document is this? (Is it a newspaper article, an advertisement, a letter, etc.)
• Who created this document?
• Who might the intended audience be for this document?
• Choose three of the photographs and text blurbs. What do these sections argue?
• Taking the document as a whole, what do you think the argument of this document is?
• Given what has been discussed about DDT, how might this document be misleading?

Extend: "DDT: The Britney Spears of Chemicals" Podcast, https://digital.sciencehistory.org/works/1831ck18w.

• What were some of the initial uses of DDT?
• When did the public start to question the use of DDT and why?
  • What are some of the different interpretations of when the public started doubting the use of DDT?
  • How did the Polio epidemic sway public opinion on DDT?
• Where do we see discourses surrounding uses of chemicals and safety in today’s media?

Excerpts: Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, 1962, Chapters 1 & 17

(see https://www.uky.edu/~tmute2/GEI-Web/GEI/GEI10/GEI%20past/GEI08-Global%20Env%20Issues/GEI%20lecturse/carson_silent-spring.pdf).

Background

• Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was published in 1962.
• Carson’s work exposed the dangers of DDT to the public, spurring an already growing environmental movement.
• Carson was born in Springdale, Pennsylvania (near Pittsburgh) in 1907, and died in 1964 after a battle with cancer.
• Carson was one of the foremost nature writers of the twentieth century.
• For more on Rachel Carson see: https://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/literary-cultural-heritage-map-pa/bios/carson__rachel_louise.

Video Source: American Experience on Rachel Carson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SeJNRaE11A0. 

Questions

• Carson’s introduction spells out a “before” and “after.” How does she describe the natural landscape like before?
  • How does she describe the condition of nature after?
• What is the cause of this change, according to Carson?
• Why might Carson have called her book Silent Spring?
• What is Carson’s call to action?
• How does Carson appeal to broad audiences beyond the scientific profession?
• How would you describe Carson’s philosophy behind humanity’s relationship with nature?
• Do you think Carson’s observations and solutions are still relevant today? If so, how? 

The First Earth Day & March to Wounded Knee, 1970 & 1973

Walter Cronkite, Earth Day CBS News Broadcast, April 22, 1970, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbwC281uzUs.

March to Wounded Knee: Earth Day World Pilgrimage Poster, 1973, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2016648085/. 

Background

• The growing popular movements aimed at environmental protection led to a major moment in 1970 with the first Earth Day.
• Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin is credited with organizing the first Earth Day, wherein activists from across the country, protested the environmental degradation caused by unchecked industrial pollution.
• The American Indian Movement (AIM) used Earth Day as a focal point of the 73-day Wounded Knee occupation in 1973.
  • AIM protested the US government’s broken promises and exploitation of American Indian land and human rights. Activists protested on the site of the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre.

Cronkite Broadcast Questions

• What are some of the environmental issues Earth Day might have remedied?
• Who participated in the first Earth Day?
  • Why might Cronkite have said Earth Day “failed?”
• What role do the media play in shaping public awareness and action on environmental issues?
• How do you think the environmental movement has evolved since 1970?
  • In what ways do you think it has succeeded, and where do challenges remain?

March to Wounded Knee Poster Questions

• Who created this poster, and when?
• Why was this poster made?
• What is on the poster, and what might these symbols represent?
• How might the goals of Earth Day align with those of AIM?

Extension Podcast and Video

• NPR Throughline Podcast, "The Force of Nature," https://www.npr.org/2021/04/19/988747549/earth-day-1970.
• PBS Video: "The American Indian Movement at Wounded Knee," https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/ush22-soc-aimwoundedknee/the-american-indian-movement-and-wounded-knee-we-shall-remain-wounded-knee/.

Environmental Movement: Legislation 

Background

The growing social and cultural movements throughout the 1960s and 1970s helped push both state and federal legislatures to pass a series of laws to combat air and water pollution, and curb species extinctions. Legislation including the Clean Air Act (1963, 1970), the Wilderness Act (1964), and the Endangered Species Act (1973), provided federal support for the conservation and protection natural environment. These acts, along with the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970, formed the backbone of modern environmental policy, as the federal government began to take a more active role in environmental protection efforts. 

Sources

• Complete Text of the Wilderness Act, 1964, https://www.nps.gov/subjects/wilderness/upload/W-Act_508.pdf/ .
• Endangered Species Act of 1973, https://www.fws.gov/sites/default/files/documents/endangered-species-act-accessible_7.pdf/.
• PBS Video: "Birth of the Clean Air Act," https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/birth-of-the-clean-air-act-video/ecosense-for-living/. 
• Fish and Wildlife Service Video: "Endangered Species Act 101," https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6wJpGO8j4Q.