Introductory description

This second year module will explore and examine the presidency of Harry S Truman (1945-1952). Each weekly lecture will introduce a new facet of Truman's presidency; the corresponding seminars will then invite students to consider Truman's impact on the topic alongside the topic's impact on post war and cold war US history (and global history). It will address key themes such as presidential power, race and resistance, hot and cold war, peacemaking and re-conversion, post war foreign and domestic policy, american exceptionalism and presidential legacies. This module will focus on Truman's first and second administrations (1945-1952) but will consider his whole lifetime (1884 - 1972) and beyond.

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

1. The First Sixty Years – Seminar: Failure
2. Accidental President – Seminar: The Atomic Bomb
3. Cold War – Seminar: The Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan
4. The Fair Deal – Seminar: Education
5. Truman and Civil Rights – Seminar: Desegregation
6. Reading Week
7. 1948 Election – Seminar: 'Dewey Defeats Truman'
8. Korea – Seminar: NSC-68 and Escalation
9. Anticommunism - Seminar: McCarthyism
10. Memory and Legacy – Seminar: The Truman Library.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Understand Harry Truman's life and work, his path to the Presidency, impact on US social development and global politics.
• Critically analyse historical writing about Truman and identify what has typically drawn focus, how Truman has been memorialised and how the historiography has developed over time and in response to contemporary understanding.
• Critically engage with the reach and restrictions of presidential power.
• Develop a deeper understanding of mid-century American history, its relevance and importance to contemporary understanding.
• Improve study, research and communication skills.

Indicative reading list

Anslover, N. L., Harry S. Truman: the coming of the Cold War (2014, New York;Oxfordshire, England;: Routledge).
Brands, H., What good is grand strategy?: power and purpose in American statecraft from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush (2014, New York, New York: Cornell University Press).
Burtin, O., A Nation of Veterans: War, Citizenship, and the Welfare State in Modern America (2022, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press).
Bush, V., R. D. Holt and R. Holt, Science, the Endless Frontier (2021, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press).
Caute, D., The great fear: the anti-Communist purge under Truman and Eisenhower (1978, London: Secker and Warburg).
Cochran, B., Harry Truman and the crisis presidency (1973, New York: Funk & Wagnalls).
Donovan, R. J., Conflict and crisis: the Presidency of Harry S. Truman, 1945-1948 (1977, New York: Norton).
Tumultuous years: the presidency of Harry S. Truman 1949-1953 (1982, London;New York;: Norton).
Elsey, G. M., An unplanned life: a memoir (2005, Columbia: University of Missouri Press).
Ferrell, R. H., Harry S. Truman: a life (1994, Columbia: University of Missouri Press).
Choosing Truman: the Democratic Convention of 1944 (2000, Columbia: University of Missouri Press).
Presidential leadership: from Woodrow Wilson to Harry S. Truman (2006, Columbia: University of Missouri Press).
Frank, J., The Trials of Harry S. Truman : The Extraordinary Presidency of an Ordinary Man, 1945-1953 (2022, New York, UNITED STATES: Simon & Schuster).
Goldzwig, S. R., Truman's whistle-stop campaign (2008, College Station: Texas A&M University Press).
Harry Truman and the Struggle for Racial Justice. Robert Shogan. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2013.
Hamby, A. L., Beyond the New Deal: Harry S. Truman and American liberalism (1973, London;New York;: Columbia University Press).
Man of the people: a life of Harry S. Truman (1995, New York;Oxford;: Oxford University Press).
Hogan, M. J., A cross of iron: Harry S. Truman and the origins of the national security state, 1945-1954 (1998, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Inboden, W., Religion and American foreign policy, 1945-1960: the soul of containment (2008, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
James, R., The Truman Court: Law and the Limits of Loyalty (2021, Piraí: University of Missouri Press).
Jenkins, R., Truman (1986, London: Collins).
Kirkendall, R. S., Harry's farewell: interpreting and teaching the Truman presidency (2004, Columbia: University of Missouri Press).
Lamb, C. M. and A. W. Nye, (2012) 'Do Presidents Control Bureaucracy? The Federal Housing Administration during the Truman-Eisenhower Era', Political science quarterly, 127: 445-67.
McClure, A. F., The Truman administration and the problems of postwar labor 1945-1948 (1969, Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press).
McCoy, D. R., (1982) 'Harry S. Truman: Personality, Politics, and Presidency', Presidential Studies Quarterly, 12: 216-25.
McCullough, D. G., Truman (1992, London;New York;: Simon & Schuster).
Miller, M. and H. S. Truman, Plain speaking: an oral biography of Harry S. Truman (1974, London: Gollancz).
Misukanis, N., (2023) 'A Servant of Two Masters: Bishop Aloisius Muench and the Debate over Catholic Schools in Postwar Bavaria', The Catholic historical review, 109: 321-50.
Offner, A. A., Another such victory: President Truman and the Cold War, 1945-1953 (2002, Stanford, Calif: Stanford University Press).
'The President Outlines a Program', (2020), JAMA : the journal of the American Medical Association, 324: 1011-11.
Reeves, M., (2023) 'Harry S. Truman: An Ordinary Man, His Extraordinary Journey . Harry S. Truman Library & Museum, Independence, MO', The Public Historian, 45: 131-36.
Robinson, E. E. and C. Commonwealth Club of, Powers of the President in foreign affairs, 1945-1965: Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson (1966, San Francisco: Commonwealth Club of California).
Savage, S. J., Truman and the Democratic Party (1997, Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky).
Schroeder, R. E., The Foundation of the CIA: Harry Truman, the Missouri Gang, and the origins of the Cold War (2017, Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press).
Smith, K. B., (1983) 'Harry Truman: Man of His Times?', Presidential Studies Quarterly, 13: 70-80.
Snetsinger, J., Truman, the Jewish vote, and the creation of Israel (1974, Stanford, California: Hoover Institution Press).
Steinberg, A., The man from Missouri: the life and times of Harry S. Truman (1962, New York: Putnam).
Taylor, J. E., Freedom to serve: Truman, civil rights, and Executive Order 9981 (2013, New York: Routledge).
Theoharis, A. G., Seeds of repression: Harry S. Truman and the origins of McCarthyism (1971, Chicago: Quadrangle Books).
Truman, H. S., Mr. Citizen (1960a, New York: Bernard Geis Associates).
Truman Speaks (1960b, New York, NY: Columbia University Press).
Truman, H. S., B. J. Bernstein and A. J. Matusow, The Truman administration: a documentary history (1968, New York: Harper Colophon Books).
Truman, H. S. and R. H. Ferrell, Off the record: the private papers of Harry S. Truman (1980, New York: Harper & Row).
Off the record: the private papers of Harry S. Truman (1982, New York, N.Y: Penguin).
Truman, H. S., R. H. Ferrell and B. W. Truman, Dear Bess: the letters from Harry to Bess Truman, 1910-1959 (1983, London;New York;: Norton).
Truman, H. S. and L. W. Koenig, The Truman administration: its principles and practice (1956, New York: New York University Press).
Walton, R. J., Henry Wallace, Harry Truman and the Cold War (1976, New York: Viking).
Williams, R. J., (1979) 'Harry S. Truman and the American Presidency', Journal of American Studies, 13: 393-408.

Research element

See Assessment.

Interdisciplinary

This module explores an explicitly political focus on a period often characterised through social experience. Students will be asked to consider historical developments alongside examinations of political power; how it is gained, wielded and lost within the context of US governance. Students will explore the importance of individual and system to their historical engagements.

International

This module will focus on the history of the USA.

Subject specific skills

See learning outcomes.

Transferable skills

Use a range of tools to conduct second year appropriate primary and secondary research. Develop strong analytical and evaluation skills. Further develop critical thinking skills. Communicate clearly and effectively in small and large group discussions. Build understanding of research processes and interdisciplinary research methods. Build digital research skills.