The Second Term Curse: Dwight Eisenhower's Second Term
During World War II, Eisenhower oversaw the invasions of North Africa and Sicily before supervising the invasions of France and Germany. He returned home from the war considered by many to be an attractive Presidential candidate, much like other victorious generals had been. He did not immediately jump into the political arena and for a time no one was sure which political party he supported. Eisenhower served as Army Chief of Staff and then took on the role as president of Columbia University. In 1951–52, he served as the first Supreme Commander of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). In 1952, the unpopularity of the Truman administration created good odds for a Republican to be elected president. Eisenhower entered the presidential race as a Republican in part to block the isolationist foreign policies of the leading Republican candidate, Senator Robert A. Taft. Taft was opposed to NATO and wanted the US to stay out of foreign entanglements. Eisenhower defeated Taft for the nomination and won the 1952 election in a landslide, defeating Adlai Stevenson II. He became the first Republican to win the Presidency since 1928.
As President, Eisenhower's main goals in office were to contain the expansion of the Soviet Union and reduce federal deficits. In 1953, he brought an end to the Korean War by letting China believe that he might use nuclear weapons in the conflict. China agreed on an armistice which remains in effect. He adopted a policy of nuclear deterrence which prioritized inexpensive nuclear weapons while reducing funding for expensive Army divisions. He also continued Harry S. Truman's policy of recognizing the Republic of China as the legitimate government of China. His administration provided major aid to help the French fight off Vietnamese Communists in the First Indochina War. After the French left he gave financial support to the new state of South Vietnam. He also supported local military coups against democratically-elected governments in Iran and Guatemala. During the Suez Crisis of 1956, Eisenhower condemned the Israeli, British and French invasion of Egypt, and he forced them to withdraw. He also condemned the Soviet invasion during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 but took no action.
Eisenhower won re-election in 1956, despite having suffered a heart attack the previous year. Eisenhower initially planned on serving only one term. He announced in February 1956 he would run again. He considered changing his running mate from incumbent Richard Nixon, especially in light of his heart condition. He personally favored Robert B. Anderson, a Democrat. Anderson rejected his offer and Nixon also did not follow Eisenhower's suggestion of taking a cabinet post. Eisenhower resolved to leave the matter in the hands of the party and they picked Nixon once again. In 1956, Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson once again, this time by an even larger landslide, winning 457 of 531 electoral votes and 57.6% of the popular vote.
In January of 1957, the CIA informed Eisenhower that Russia had the capability to launch a small payload into orbit and was likely to do so within a year. Eisenhower's support of the nation's fledgling space program was modest at first. But the Soviet launch of Sputnik later in 1957 gained the Soviets enormous prestige. In response to Sputnik being launched in October 1957, Eisenhower created NASA as a civilian space agency in October 1958. Eisenhower wanted to create a surveillance satellite to detect any threats, as well as ballistic missiles that would protect the United States. He devised a strategy of nuclear deterrence based upon the triad of B-52 bombers, land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and Polaris submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). But he saw NASA's plansof human spaceflight as too costly. He was quoted as saying, "Anyone who would spend $40 billion in a race to the moon for national prestige is nuts."
In November 1956, just after the election, Eisenhower forced an end to the combined British, French and Israeli invasion of Egypt in response to the Suez Crisis. He also condemned the brutal Soviet invasion of Hungary in response to the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. He used financial and diplomatic pressure to make the British and French withdraw from Egypt. After the Suez Crisis the United States became the protector of unstable friendly governments in the Middle East. The "Eisenhower Doctrine", designed by Secretary of State Foster Dulles, held the U.S. would be "prepared to use armed force against aggression from any country controlled by international communism". It held that the United States would provide economic and military aid and, if necessary, use military force to stop the spread of communism in the Middle East. Eisenhower applied the doctrine in 1957 and 1958 by dispensing economic aid to shore up the Kingdom of Jordan, and by encouraging Syria's neighbors to consider military operations against it. In July 1958, he sent 15,000 Marines and soldiers to Lebanon as part of Operation Blue Bat, a non-combat peace-keeping mission to stabilize the pro-Western government and to prevent a radical revolution from sweeping over that country. The mission was successful and the Marines departed three months later.
The Eisenhower administration declared racial discrimination a national security issue. He noted that Communists around the world used the racial discrimination and history of violence in the U.S. as a point of propaganda attack. Eisenhower directed District of Columbia officials to make Washington a model for the rest of the country in integrating public schools. He proposed to Congress the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and of 1960 and signed those acts into law. The 1957 act for the first time established a permanent civil rights office inside the Justice Department and a Civil Rights Commission to hear testimony about abuses of voting rights. Although both acts were much weaker than subsequent civil rights legislation, they were the first significant civil rights acts since 1875.
In 1957, the state of Arkansas refused to honor a federal court order to integrate their public school system. Eisenhower demanded that Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus obey the court order. When Faubus refused, Eisenhower placed the Arkansas National Guard under federal control and sent in the 101st Airborne Division. They escorted and protected nine African-American students' entry to Little Rock Central High School, an all-white public school. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote to Eisenhower to thank him for his actions. King wrote, "The overwhelming majority of southerners, Negro and white, stand firmly behind your resolute action to restore law and order in Little Rock".
An incident that occurred near the end of Eisenhower's presidency resulted in a loss of prestige and a huge public relations victory for the Soviet Union at Eisenhower's expense. On May 1, 1960, a U.S. one-man U-2 spy plane was reported as shot down at high altitude over Soviet Union airspace. The flight's mission was to gain photo intelligence before the scheduled opening of an East-West summit conference, which was scheduled to take place in Paris, 15 days later. Captain Francis Gary Powers had bailed out of his aircraft and was captured after parachuting down onto Russian soil. Four days after Powers disappeared, the Eisenhower Administration had NASA issue a very detailed press release noting that an aircraft had "gone missing" north of Turkey. It speculated that the pilot might have fallen unconscious while the autopilot was still engaged. It falsely claimed that "the pilot reported over the emergency frequency that he was experiencing oxygen difficulties."
Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev announced that a "spy-plane" had been shot down over Russian soil, but he intentionally made no reference to the pilot. The Eisenhower Administration believed that Powers had died in the crash. Eisenhower authorized the release of a false cover story claiming that the plane was a "weather research aircraft" which had unintentionally strayed into Soviet airspace after the pilot had radioed "difficulties with his oxygen equipment" while flying over Turkey. The Soviets then revealed that they had captured Captain Powers and put him on trial. They displayed parts of the U-2, which had been recovered almost fully intact.
The incident led to the cancellation of the Four Power Paris Summit. The summit was supposed to take place in May 1960 with Eisenhower, Nikita Khrushchev, Harold Macmillan and Charles de Gaulle attending. Eisenhower refused to satisfy Khrushchev's demands that he apologize, and when Eisehower refused, Khrushchev decided not to take part in the summit. Up until this time, Eisenhower felt he had been making progress towards better relations with the Soviet Union. Nuclear arms reduction and Berlin were on the agenda for discussion at the summit. Eisenhower later said that it had all been ruined because of that "stupid U-2 business".
The affair was an embarrassment for Eisenhower and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a lengthy inquiry into the U-2 incident. In Russia, Captain Powers made a forced confession and apology. On August 19, 1960, Powers was convicted of espionage and sentenced to imprisonment. On February 10, 1962, Powers was exchanged for Rudolf Abel in Berlin and returned to the U.S.
The 22nd Amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1951. It set term limits to the presidency of two terms and Eisenhower became the first U.S. president constitutionally prevented from running for re-election to a third term. In the 1960 election, Eisenhower supported his Vice-President, Richard Nixon for President, believing that Democrat John F. Kennedy lacked the experience to be President. He told friends, "I will do almost anything to avoid turning my chair and country over to Kennedy." He actively campaigned for Nixon in the final days, but a last minute gaffe by Eisenhower likely hurt Nixon's campaign. When asked by reporters at the end of a televised press conference to list one of Nixon's policy ideas he had adopted, Eisenhower paused and said, "If you give me a week, I might think of one. I don't remember." Kennedy's campaign used the quote in one of its campaign commercials. Nixon narrowly lost the election to Kennedy.
On January 17, 1961, Eisenhower gave his final televised Address to the Nation from the Oval Office. In his farewell address, Eisenhower discussed the Cold War and said "We face a hostile ideology global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose and insidious in method." He warned Americans about what he saw as unjustified government spending proposals and continued with a warning that "we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military–industrial complex." He added, "The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."
As President, Eisenhower's main goals in office were to contain the expansion of the Soviet Union and reduce federal deficits. In 1953, he brought an end to the Korean War by letting China believe that he might use nuclear weapons in the conflict. China agreed on an armistice which remains in effect. He adopted a policy of nuclear deterrence which prioritized inexpensive nuclear weapons while reducing funding for expensive Army divisions. He also continued Harry S. Truman's policy of recognizing the Republic of China as the legitimate government of China. His administration provided major aid to help the French fight off Vietnamese Communists in the First Indochina War. After the French left he gave financial support to the new state of South Vietnam. He also supported local military coups against democratically-elected governments in Iran and Guatemala. During the Suez Crisis of 1956, Eisenhower condemned the Israeli, British and French invasion of Egypt, and he forced them to withdraw. He also condemned the Soviet invasion during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 but took no action.
Eisenhower won re-election in 1956, despite having suffered a heart attack the previous year. Eisenhower initially planned on serving only one term. He announced in February 1956 he would run again. He considered changing his running mate from incumbent Richard Nixon, especially in light of his heart condition. He personally favored Robert B. Anderson, a Democrat. Anderson rejected his offer and Nixon also did not follow Eisenhower's suggestion of taking a cabinet post. Eisenhower resolved to leave the matter in the hands of the party and they picked Nixon once again. In 1956, Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson once again, this time by an even larger landslide, winning 457 of 531 electoral votes and 57.6% of the popular vote.
In January of 1957, the CIA informed Eisenhower that Russia had the capability to launch a small payload into orbit and was likely to do so within a year. Eisenhower's support of the nation's fledgling space program was modest at first. But the Soviet launch of Sputnik later in 1957 gained the Soviets enormous prestige. In response to Sputnik being launched in October 1957, Eisenhower created NASA as a civilian space agency in October 1958. Eisenhower wanted to create a surveillance satellite to detect any threats, as well as ballistic missiles that would protect the United States. He devised a strategy of nuclear deterrence based upon the triad of B-52 bombers, land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and Polaris submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). But he saw NASA's plansof human spaceflight as too costly. He was quoted as saying, "Anyone who would spend $40 billion in a race to the moon for national prestige is nuts."
In November 1956, just after the election, Eisenhower forced an end to the combined British, French and Israeli invasion of Egypt in response to the Suez Crisis. He also condemned the brutal Soviet invasion of Hungary in response to the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. He used financial and diplomatic pressure to make the British and French withdraw from Egypt. After the Suez Crisis the United States became the protector of unstable friendly governments in the Middle East. The "Eisenhower Doctrine", designed by Secretary of State Foster Dulles, held the U.S. would be "prepared to use armed force against aggression from any country controlled by international communism". It held that the United States would provide economic and military aid and, if necessary, use military force to stop the spread of communism in the Middle East. Eisenhower applied the doctrine in 1957 and 1958 by dispensing economic aid to shore up the Kingdom of Jordan, and by encouraging Syria's neighbors to consider military operations against it. In July 1958, he sent 15,000 Marines and soldiers to Lebanon as part of Operation Blue Bat, a non-combat peace-keeping mission to stabilize the pro-Western government and to prevent a radical revolution from sweeping over that country. The mission was successful and the Marines departed three months later.
The Eisenhower administration declared racial discrimination a national security issue. He noted that Communists around the world used the racial discrimination and history of violence in the U.S. as a point of propaganda attack. Eisenhower directed District of Columbia officials to make Washington a model for the rest of the country in integrating public schools. He proposed to Congress the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and of 1960 and signed those acts into law. The 1957 act for the first time established a permanent civil rights office inside the Justice Department and a Civil Rights Commission to hear testimony about abuses of voting rights. Although both acts were much weaker than subsequent civil rights legislation, they were the first significant civil rights acts since 1875.
In 1957, the state of Arkansas refused to honor a federal court order to integrate their public school system. Eisenhower demanded that Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus obey the court order. When Faubus refused, Eisenhower placed the Arkansas National Guard under federal control and sent in the 101st Airborne Division. They escorted and protected nine African-American students' entry to Little Rock Central High School, an all-white public school. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote to Eisenhower to thank him for his actions. King wrote, "The overwhelming majority of southerners, Negro and white, stand firmly behind your resolute action to restore law and order in Little Rock".
An incident that occurred near the end of Eisenhower's presidency resulted in a loss of prestige and a huge public relations victory for the Soviet Union at Eisenhower's expense. On May 1, 1960, a U.S. one-man U-2 spy plane was reported as shot down at high altitude over Soviet Union airspace. The flight's mission was to gain photo intelligence before the scheduled opening of an East-West summit conference, which was scheduled to take place in Paris, 15 days later. Captain Francis Gary Powers had bailed out of his aircraft and was captured after parachuting down onto Russian soil. Four days after Powers disappeared, the Eisenhower Administration had NASA issue a very detailed press release noting that an aircraft had "gone missing" north of Turkey. It speculated that the pilot might have fallen unconscious while the autopilot was still engaged. It falsely claimed that "the pilot reported over the emergency frequency that he was experiencing oxygen difficulties."
Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev announced that a "spy-plane" had been shot down over Russian soil, but he intentionally made no reference to the pilot. The Eisenhower Administration believed that Powers had died in the crash. Eisenhower authorized the release of a false cover story claiming that the plane was a "weather research aircraft" which had unintentionally strayed into Soviet airspace after the pilot had radioed "difficulties with his oxygen equipment" while flying over Turkey. The Soviets then revealed that they had captured Captain Powers and put him on trial. They displayed parts of the U-2, which had been recovered almost fully intact.
The incident led to the cancellation of the Four Power Paris Summit. The summit was supposed to take place in May 1960 with Eisenhower, Nikita Khrushchev, Harold Macmillan and Charles de Gaulle attending. Eisenhower refused to satisfy Khrushchev's demands that he apologize, and when Eisehower refused, Khrushchev decided not to take part in the summit. Up until this time, Eisenhower felt he had been making progress towards better relations with the Soviet Union. Nuclear arms reduction and Berlin were on the agenda for discussion at the summit. Eisenhower later said that it had all been ruined because of that "stupid U-2 business".
The affair was an embarrassment for Eisenhower and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a lengthy inquiry into the U-2 incident. In Russia, Captain Powers made a forced confession and apology. On August 19, 1960, Powers was convicted of espionage and sentenced to imprisonment. On February 10, 1962, Powers was exchanged for Rudolf Abel in Berlin and returned to the U.S.
The 22nd Amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1951. It set term limits to the presidency of two terms and Eisenhower became the first U.S. president constitutionally prevented from running for re-election to a third term. In the 1960 election, Eisenhower supported his Vice-President, Richard Nixon for President, believing that Democrat John F. Kennedy lacked the experience to be President. He told friends, "I will do almost anything to avoid turning my chair and country over to Kennedy." He actively campaigned for Nixon in the final days, but a last minute gaffe by Eisenhower likely hurt Nixon's campaign. When asked by reporters at the end of a televised press conference to list one of Nixon's policy ideas he had adopted, Eisenhower paused and said, "If you give me a week, I might think of one. I don't remember." Kennedy's campaign used the quote in one of its campaign commercials. Nixon narrowly lost the election to Kennedy.
On January 17, 1961, Eisenhower gave his final televised Address to the Nation from the Oval Office. In his farewell address, Eisenhower discussed the Cold War and said "We face a hostile ideology global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose and insidious in method." He warned Americans about what he saw as unjustified government spending proposals and continued with a warning that "we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military–industrial complex." He added, "The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."