Question 1
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Reagan supported the New Deal, but later came to believe that agencies like
the Works Progress Administration, which put people to work building roads,
bridges, and other projects, was undermined bureaucracy– and specifically,
federal welfare workers who discouraged able-bodied men from working
because they were already being taken care of by a welfare system.
True
False
Question 2
1.5 / 1.5 pts
This 1950 book argued that liberalism prevailed so completely in American
life that conservatism might be viewed as forever illegitimate, and that
liberalism was not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition.
The Vital Center, by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.
The New America Right, by Daniel Bell
The Liberal Imagination, by Lionel Trilling
The Radical Right, by Daniel Bell
Danger on the Right, by Arnold Forster & Benjamin Epstein
Question 3
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which of the following is true about Reagan in the late 1940s and early
1950s?
He identified with the Harry Truman wing of the Democratic Party on foreign
policy.
He insisted that it was America’s duty to face & defeat the Soviet threat in
the Cold War.
He became the host of General Electric Theater, and spent some of his time
touring GE plants in the United States.
All of the above
A & C only
Question 4
1.5 / 1.5 pts
While President Dwight Eisenhower (1953-1961) was the first Republican
elected President since 1932, he was not especially popular with many “far
right” conservatives. Why?
He supported a more active role for the federal government in both domestic
and foreign policy
He did not roll back the New Deal, but wanted instead to make it more
efficient.
He sought negotiations with the Soviet Union, and even welcomed Soviet
Premiere Nikita Khrushchev to the United States in the late 1950s.
All of the above
None of the above—He was very popular with conservatives
Question 5
1.5 / 1.5 pts
In the early 1930s, Reagan was a sports announcer for a radio station first in
Davenport, and then in Des Moines, Iowa. It was in this job that he began to
learn about airtime delivery and cadence and giving his words more emotion.
True
False
Question 6
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Virtually all postwar conservatives, including Reagan, held two core beliefs:
that flawed human nature was an unchanging mixture of both good and evil,
and that an objective moral order existed, independent of humanity.
True
False
Question 7
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Why did Whittaker Chambers’ 1952 work, Witness, appeal to conservatives?
It articulated eloquently the growing conviction that America faced a
transcendent crisis—Communism.
It placed the Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union in a religious
framework. Communism was a religion—a religion of Man replacing God.
America’s choice, then, was inescapable: God or Man, Soul or Mind, Freedom
or Communism.
It insisted that there was continuity between communism and liberalism.
Communism was just liberalism’s most radical expression.
All of the above
None of the above. The work did not appeal to conservatives.
Question 8
1.5 / 1.5 pts
This traditional conservative was an English professor at the University of
Chicago, who, in 1948, published Ideas Have Consequences. Overall, he
argued that the West had abandoned its belief in absolute and eternal truths
and had placed its faith in relativism, rationalism, and human perfectibility.
The result was that secularism and pragmatism had eroded the moral
foundations required for free, democratic societies.
William F. Buckley
Leo Strauss
Ludwig von Mises
Richard M. Weaver
Russell Kirk
Question 9
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Reagan had very little success in acting. He played in only a few B films
during his career, and never landed a major motion picture deal.
True
False
Question 10
1.5 / 1.5 pts
In his 1955 essay “The Pseudoconservatives,” historian Richard Hofstadter
identified several reasons for the presence of conservatives in the post-World
War II era. Which of the following is NOT one of those reasons?
Mass communication enabled average Americans to participate in politics in
ways previously unthinkable, injecting their “private emotions and personal
problems” into the mix.
The long reign of liberalism gave rise to the increased frustration of those
who felt disenfranchised by government activism.
Frustration by the continued but confusing war footing on which the country
had remained after WWII.
People felt that they were champions—“superpowers” who did not need
government.
Question 11
1.5 / 1.5 pts
This conservative vice president and labor strategist at General Electric
championed free market fundamentalism, lower taxes, and limited
government. He was also a staunch anti-communist, and became a mentor
and father figure to Reagan.
Fredrich Haeyk
Lemuel Boulware
Russell Kirk
William Buckley
Lionel Trilling
Question 12
1.5 / 1.5 pts
In his Omnipotent Government (1944), this Austrian-born economist argued
that Nazism was not a product of capitalism but of government control.
Whittaker Chambers
Ludwig von Mises
William F. Buckley
Fredrich Hayek
Russell Kirk
Question 13
1.5 / 1.5 pts
The Reagans were a wealthy Republican family that did not experience the
economic hardships of the Great Depression.
True
False
Question 14
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which of the following is true about the postwar American economy?
It competed in a globalized market-place, challenging old ideas of
nationalism and patriotism.
The workforce became more white collar & less unionized.
As the focus on mass production shifted to high tech, companies left the
large cities of the East for more favorable business environments in the
Sunbelt.
In the northeast, large numbers of whites and black professionals deserted
the older cities, leaving behind squalid, deteriorating urban cores marked by
sharp rises in unemployment, out-of-wedlock births, illiteracy, and crime.
All of the above
Question 15
1.5 / 1.5 pts
What was the job that Reagan wanted after high school that– had he gotten
it– would have resulted in his never leaving Illinois?
Radio announcer at a local Dixon station
Manager of the sporting goods department at Montgomery Ward
Mayor of Dixon
Lifeguard
High school drama teacher
Question 16
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which the following is TRUE about Harold Bell Wright’s That Printer of Udell’s
(1903)?
It was an inspirational novel that told the uplifting tale of Dick Falkner, who
rose from a childhood of poverty and the disgrace of an alcoholic father to a
life of respect and public service.
It was the story of a battle between right and wrong, and left Reagan with a
belief in the triumph of good over evil.
Reagan viewed the book as a model for his own life.
All of the above
A & B only
Question 17
1.5 / 1.5 pts
This Democrat from Iowa was a liberal who broke with Democratic President
Harry Truman in 1946. He charged Truman with arrogance and
incompetence in the realm of foreign affairs, and insisted that the U.S. was
responsible (in part) for the Soviet distrust of the West. In 1948, he bolted
the party and ran as a Progressive candidate for President.
George McGovern
Ronald Reagan
Henry Wallace
William Buckley
Lemuel Boulware
Question 18
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which of the following is true about Reagan’s early speeches such as
“Encroaching Control” and “America the Beautiful”?
He expressed his absolute belief in American exceptionalism, and that
America was a place in the divine scheme of things that had been set apart
as a promised land.
He described the attempted communist takeover of Hollywood in the 1940s.
He insisted that since the U.S. was too strong militarily to be overtaken by
the USSR, the Kremlin’s design was subvert the U.S. step by step, socialist
measure by socialist measure.
He argued that liberal Democrats sponsored measures, including
government-financed medical care—that would lead to “statism.”
All of the above
Question 19
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which of the following is NOT true about the John Birch Society?
It was founded in Indiana in 1958 by Robert Welch
It was named after an American Baptist missionary in China who was killed
by Communists in 1945.
It was a grassroots anti-Communist organization that regularly petitioned the
government.
Its founder called Republican President Eisenhower a Communist.
It offered critical support and assistance to the Civil Rights Movement in
1964.
Question 20
1.5 / 1.5 pts
This 1953 work offered a sweeping account of conservative tradition, noting
that it was rooted in the “moral imagination” of Edmund Burke and his
defense of tradition, order, and “permanent things.” It also offered a
definition of conservativism, insisting that a conservative was someone
convinced that “civilized society requires orders and classes, believes that
man has an evil nature and therefore must control his will and appetite,” and
accepts that “tradition provides a check on man’s anarchic impulse, and
maintains a belief in a divine intent that rules society as well as conscience.”
Witness, by Whittaker Chambers
The Radical Right, by Daniel Bell
The Conservative Mind, by Russell Kirk
The Conscience of a Conservative, by Barry Goldwater
God and Man at Yale, by William F. Buckley
Question 21
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which film did Reagan believe to be the finest picture he ever appeared in?
It was also his only film in which there was talk of an Academy Award.
Yankee Doodle Dandy
Love in the Air
Santa Fe Trail
Knute Rockne– All American
King’s Row
Question 22
1.5 / 1.5 pts
How was the family transformed in the post-WWII era?
More women went to college and developed professional careers.
Marriage ages increased, family size decreased, and the divorce rate went up
There was an increase in the standard of living– middle class affluence–
allowed Americans to devote more time to lifestyle and spiritual issues.
All of the above
B & C only
Question 23
1.5 / 1.5 pts
The founder of National Review in 1955, and the author of the popular God
and Man at Yale (1951).
Russell Kirk
Barry Goldwater
William F. Buckley
Robert Welch
Ronald Reagan
Question 24
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Ronald Reagan was a staunch Democrat in his youth. Indeed, Franklin
Roosevelt was his hero.
True
False
Question 25
1.5 / 1.5 pts
In his 1944 work, The Road to Serfdom, this Austrian-born economist argued
that economic planning leads to dictatorship. “Economic control,” he wrote,
“is not merely control of a sector of human life which can be separated from
the rest; it is the control of the means for all our ends.”
Whittaker Chambers
Ludwig von Mises
William F. Buckley
Fredrich Hayek
Russell Kirk
Question 26
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan—although both Republicans—were fierce
opponents who generally disliked each other and refused to work together in
the 1950s and 1960s.
True
False
Question 27
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Reagan cast his first vote for President for this man:
Calvin Coolidge
Herbert Hoover
Franklin Roosevelt
Warren Harding
Himself
Question 28
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Reagan was born in Tampico, Illinois, but spent most of his youth in nearby
Dixon. Reagan’s father was an Irish-Catholic and an alcoholic. His weakness
with alcohol was not hard times drinking but “good times” drinking.
True
False
Question 29
1.5 / 1.5 pts
This author of A Choice Not An Echo (1964), was a key figure in grassroots
conservatism, possessing a talent for translating conservative ideas to
grassroots activists and motivating them to achieve goals. A critic of “me
too Republicans,” this conservative activist mobilized the grassroots on
behalf of Barry Goldwater in the Republican presidential primaries of 1964.
Robert Welch
Phyllis Schlafly
Thomas Dewey
George Romney
Pat Brown
Question 30
1.5 / 1.5 pts
Which of following is NOT true regarding Barry Goldwater in 1964?
He won the Republican presidential nomination after moderates failed to
unite to stop him.
He and his grassroots supporters were viewed by many Americans as “hard
right”-- xenophobic, prejudiced, and fearful of modernity
In an effort to create party unity he selected Michigan Governor George
Romney as his running-mate.
He helped forge a party platform that reflected his positions—i.e. the plank
contained a weak civil rights plank and a hard line on foreign policy and
defense.
He failed to win 40% of the popular vote in November, and carried only his
home state (Arizona) and few states in the South.
Question 31
6 / 10 pts
Identify and explain the different strands of postwar American conservatism.
Using the Pemberton text (chapter 3), why did conservativism thrive in the
United States by the late 1960s and early 1970s?
