The first exam will consist of ten short answer questions (4-5 sentences each, 50% of test grade) and one long essay (50%).  Be prepared to answer questions on any of the material covered in class: the readings from texts, the course pack, lecture material, and film clips. 

ESSAY QUESTION 
You will receive one of three questions below on the essay section.  You will not know which one of the three will be on the exam, so study for all of them.  Some pointers: answer the question as directly and clearly as possible.  Be sure to address all the components of the question.  Remember to integrate the relevant reading and lecture material to support your argument.  Always avoid vague generalizations.  Refer to specific events, policies, groups, ideas and individuals in your answers.  Paper will be provided for your longer essay.  

1. Were progressives the forerunners of modern liberalism?  Why or why not?

2. Why do many scholars describe the New Deal as the starting point of American liberalism?  How would Franklin Roosevelt’s policies influence liberalism in the US?

3. How would war—WWI, WWII, and the Cold War—shape the course of American liberalism?

Classical Liberalism
John Locke
Utilitarianism
Louis Hartz on the American liberal tradition
The New Republic
The Goldwaters
Theological Modernism
The Social Gospel
Walter Rauschenbusch
The generational aspect of the American Left
The Left and the American working class
Robert Wiebe on the late 19th century shift in American society
Eugene V. Debs
Hull House
Walter Lippman
Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s background
New Deal work relief
John Maynard Keynes
V. O. Key on the American South
Henry Stimson and the “American Establishment”
Dwight Eisenhower’s “Dynamic Conservatism”
Cold War liberalism
Religion and American liberalism
Reinhold Niebuhr
Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.