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The 1930s were
described as an abrupt shift to more radical and conservative lifestyles, as countries were struggling to find a solution
to the Great Depression. In East Asia, the rise of militarism occurred.
In Western Europe, Australia and the United
States, more progressive reforms occurred as opposed to the extreme measures sought elsewhere. Roosevelt's New Deal attempted
to use government spending to combat large-scale unemployment and severely negative growth. Ultimately, it would be the beginning
of World War II in 1939 that would end the depression.
The Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning
the Golden Gate, the opening of the San Francisco Bay into the Pacific Ocean. As part of both U.S. Route 101 and California
State Route 1, it connects the city of San Francisco on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula to Marin County. The
Golden Gate Bridge was the longest suspension bridge span in the world when it was completed during the year 1937, and has
become an internationally recognized symbol of San Francisco and California. Since its completion, the span length has been
surpassed by eight other bridges. It still has the second longest suspension bridge main span in the United States, after
the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York City. In 1999, it was ranked fifth on the List of America's Favorite Architecture
by the American Institute of Architects.
Before the bridge was built, the only practical short route between San
Francisco and what is now Marin County was by boat across a section of San Francisco Bay. Ferry service began as early as
1820, with regularly scheduled service beginning in the 1840s for purposes of transporting water to San Francisco. The Sausalito
Land and Ferry Company service, launched in 1867, eventually became the Golden Gate Ferry Company, a Southern Pacific Railroad
subsidiary, the largest ferry operation in the world by the late 1920s. Once for railroad passengers and customers only,
Southern Pacific's automobile ferries became very profitable and important to the regional economy, The ferry crossing
between the Hyde Street Pier in San Francisco and Sausalito in Marin County took approximately 20 minutes and cost US$1.00
per vehicle, a price later reduced to compete with the new bridge. The trip from the San Francisco Ferry Building took 27
minutes.
Many wanted to build a bridge to connect San Francisco to Marin County. San Francisco was the largest
American city still served primarily by ferry boats. Because it did not have a permanent link with communities around the
bay, the city’s growth rate was below the national average. Many experts said that a bridge couldn’t be built
across the 6,700 ft (2,042 m) strait. It had strong, swirling tides and currents, with water 500 ft (150 m) in depth at the
center of the channel, and frequent strong winds. Experts said that ferocious winds and blinding fogs would prevent construction
and operation
Hitler appointed
German chancellor, gets dictatorial powers. Reichstag fire in Berlin; Nazi terror begins. Germany and Japan withdraw from
League of Nations. Giuseppe Zangara executed for attempted assassination of president-elect Roosevelt in which Chicago mayor
Cermak is fatally shot. Roosevelt inaugurated (the only thing we have to fear is fear itself); launches New Deal. Prohibition
repealed. USSR recognized by U.S.
The term Nazism or National Socialism (German: Nationalsozialismus) refers primarily to the ideology
and practices of the Nazi Party under Adolf Hitler; and the policies adopted by the government of Nazi Germany from 1933 to
1945, a period also known as the Third Reich. The official name of the Nazi party was the National Socialist German Workers'
Party, (German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterparteior NSDAP). Nazism was the main form of National Socialism that
emerged after World War I, and is generally considered by scholars to be a form of fascism.
Nazism
was not a monolithic movement, but rather a (mainly German) combination of various ideologies and groups, sparked by anger
at the Treaty of Versailles and what was considered to have been a Jewish/Communist conspiracy (known in the vernacular as
the Dolchstoßlegende or "Stab-in-the-Back Legend") to humiliate Germany at the end of the First World War
October 29, 1929,
was a dark day in history. "Black Tuesday" is the day that the stock market crashed, officially setting off the
Great Depression. Unemployment skyrocketed--a quarter of the workforce was without jobs by 1933 and many people became homeless.
President Herbert Hoover attempted to handle the crisis but he was unable to improve the situation. In 1932, Franklin Delano
Roosevelt was elected president and he promised a "New Deal" for the American people. Congress created The Works
Progress Administration (WPA) which offered work relief for thousands of people.
The end to the Great Depression
came about in 1941 with America's entry into World War II. America sided with Britain, France and the Soviet Union against
Germany, Italy, and Japan. The loss of lives in this war was staggering. The European part of the war ended with Germany's
surrender in May 1945. Japan surrendered in September 1945, after the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Nazi
ideology drew on the racist doctrines of the comte de Gobineau and Houston Stewart Chamberlain, on the nationalism of Heinrich
von Treitschke, and on the hero-cult of Friedrich Nietzsche, often transforming the ideas of these thinkers. Nazi dogma, partly
articulated by Hitler in Mein Kampf, was elaborated by the fanatical Alfred Rosenberg. Vague and mystical, it was not a system
of well-defined principles but rather a glorification of prejudice and myth with elements of nihilism. Its mainstays were
the doctrines of racial inequality and of adherence to the leader, or Führer; its constant theme was nationalist expansion.
Prohibition in
the United States refers to attempts to legally ban alcohol sales and consumption. The term often refers specifically to the
period from 1920 to 1933, during which alcohol sale, manufacture and transportation were banned throughout the United States
as mandated in the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Prohibition can also encompass the antecedent religious
and political temperance movements calling for sumptuary laws to end or encumber alcohol use
The Enigma machine
is any of a family of related electro-mechanical rotor machines that have been used to generate ciphers for the encryption
and decryption of secret messages. The Enigma was invented by German engineer Arthur Scherbius at the end of World War I It
was used commercially from the early 1920s and was adopted by military and governmental services of a number of countries
— most notably by Nazi Germany before and during World War II A variety of Enigma models were produced, but the
German military model, the Wehrmacht Enigma, is the version most commonly discussed.
The Enigma machine was a cipher machine used to encrypt and decrypt secret
messages. More precisely, Enigma was a family of related electro-mechanical rotor machines, comprising
a variety of different models.
The Enigma was used commercially from the early 1920s
on, and was also adopted by the military and governmental services of a number of nations most famously by Nazi Germany
before and during World War II.
The German military model, the Wehrmacht Enigma, is
the version most commonly discussed. The machine has gained notoriety because Allied cryptologists
were able to decrypt a large number of messages that had been enciphered on the machine. Decryption
was made possible in 1932 by Polish cryptographers Marian Rejewski, Jerzy Róycki and Henryk
Zygalski from Cipher Bureau. In mid-1939 reconstruction and decryption methods were delivered from Poland to Britain
and France. The intelligence gained through this source, codenamed ULTRA, was a significant aid to the
Allied war effort.
The machine has gained
notoriety because Allied cryptologists were able to decrypt a vast number of messages that had been enciphered on the machine.
The intelligence, consequently codenamed ULTRA, was a substantial aid to the Allied war effort. The exact influence of ULTRA
is debated, but an oft-repeated assessment is that decryption of German ciphers hastened the end of the European war by two
years
Wallis Simpson
was the American divorcee for whom King Edward VIII gave up the throne of Great Britain. She met the future king (then Prince
of Wales) early in the 1930s and a few years later they became lovers, though she remained married to her second husband,
businessman Ernest Simpson. Matters came to a head when Edward became king in 1936. Simpson filed for divorce from her husband,
but the royal family and the British government would not allow Edward to marry her. In December Edward stepped down as king,
saying in a radio broadcast "I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge
my duties as king as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love." They were married in France
on 3 June 1937, becoming the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, and spent the rest of their lives in exile from England, living
mainly in France and the United States. In 2003 the British government released documents showing that while she was involved
with Edward in the years before he became king,
Teresa Billington, the daughter of a shipping clerk,
was born in Blackburn, Lancashire in 1877. Teresa had a stormy relationship with her parents. There was constant conflict
concerning her disagreement with her parents' strong Roman Catholic views. Teresa ran away from home as a teenager and
for the rest of her life was an outspoken agnostic.
Teresa became a pupil-teacher and eventually found work as
a schoolteacher in Manchester. However, Teresa's refused to teach religious instruction and this led to the Manchester
Education Committee threatening to sack her. Emmeline Pankhurst, a member of the Manchester Education Committee, was impressed
by Teresa's spirit and arranged for her to be transferred to a Jewish school where she would not have to teach religion.
With Emmeline Pankhurst's encouragement, Teresa Billington became a member of the Independent Labour Party in
Manchester. In 1904 she was appointed as the organiser of the party in Manchester. Teresa also became involved in trade union
issues. She objected to the fact that men received higher wages than women and became secretary of the Manchester Equal Pay
Committee.
Teresa also joined the Women's Social and Political Union and in 1907 she was asked to become a
full-time worker for the organisation in London. Within a few months of arriving, Teresa had been arrested and sent to Holloway
Prison. That year she also married a Scotsman living in London called Frederick Greig. He was sympathetic to women's rights
and agreed to adopt Billington-Greig as their joint name.
Teresa, like other suffrages at the time, questioned
the way that Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst were running the WSPU. She objected to the way they made decisions without
consulting members. Teresa also felt that a small group of wealthy women were beginning to dominate the organisation and in
1907 she left the WSPU with Charlotte Despard to form the Women's Freedom League.
Teresa Billington-Greig also
came into conflict with Margaret Bondfield over the issue of adult suffrage. Billington-Greig argued that women's political
organisations should be advocating the "immediate granting of the Parliamentary Franchise to women on the same terms
as men in the speediest and most practical way to real democracy". Bondfield took the view that if this happened the
Conservatives would gain an advantage over the Labour Party. Bondfield also feared that once middle-class women had the vote,
many of the leaders of the WSPU and NUWSS would lose interest in fighting for the political rights of working-class women.
In December 1907, a public debate took place between Billington-Greig and Bondfield on this issue. Billington-Greig won the
vote that followed the debate by 171 to 139.
Teresa Billington-Greig and other members of the Women's Freedom
League were often sent to prison after being arrested on demonstrations. However, Billington-Greig and this group completely
rejected the increasing violent tactics of the WSPU. In an article that she wrote, Teresa accused Emmeline Pankhurst and Christabel
Pankhurst of "emotionalism, personal tyranny and fanaticism."
In 1910 Billington-Greig declared that
she intended to "work for women's suffrage independently". This mainly involved her writing books such as The
Militant Suffrage Movement (1911), Consumers in Revolt (1912) and Women and the Machine (1913).
After the passing
of the Equal Franchise Act in 1928 Billington-Greig concentrated her efforts on increasing the number of women in the House
of Commons and for several years was the director of the Women for Westminster group. Teresa Billington-Greig died in 1964.
Yorkshire-born Amy
Johnson only began to be interested in flying in 1928 when she was 25, while she was working as a secretary in London. Born
in Hull she had gained a BA in economics from the University of Sheffield but this was pre-war Britain and the work prospects
for women were very limited. Perhaps that was the spur to her forging a new life in aviation.
On July 6 1929 she gained her pilot’s license at the London Aviation Club, but not content with
that she pushed on and studied for a ground engineer’s license, which she achieved not long afterwards. In a huge hurry
to prove herself, and to gain fame, she began to consider what would put her in the public gaze, and prove her worth as a
top pilot. The answer was to fly solo to Australia, the first woman to manage this, hopefully breaking the existing record
of 16 days held by Bert Hinkler.
Attempts
to raise the money for an aircraft in which to accomplish the feat initially yielded little or no support, but eventually
oil magnate Lord Wakefield and her father, head of a fish merchant business, stumped up the £600 needed: G-AAAH, a De
Havilland Gipsy Moth DH60 was obtained second hand with the funds. These may have been simpler times, but commercial needs
were still important: the plane was named Jason after the trademark used by her father’s company.
Johnson set out from Croydon Aerodrome on May 5 1930,
less than a year after receiving her pilot’s license, and arrived in Darwin on May 24, 11,000 miles and 19 days later.
So though she gained the fame she desired, she did not take the record she had set her sights on.
Amy Johnson’s
subsequent career did, however, see her breaking records, alone and with her husband Jim Mollison. She died during WWII when
she went off course during a flight for the Air Transport Auxiliary, drowning after ditching in the Thames Estuary.
On 5 January 1941, while flying an Airspeed Oxford from
Blackpool to RAF Kidlington near Oxford, Johnson went off course in poor weather. She drowned after bailing out into the Thames
Estuary. Although she was seen alive in the water, a rescue attempt failed and her body was never recovered. The incident
also led to the death of her would-be rescuer, Lt Cmdr Walter Fletcher of HMS Haslemere. There is still some mystery about
the accident, as the exact reason for the flight is still a government secret and there is some evidence that besides Johnson
and Fletcher a third person (possibly someone she was supposed to ferry somewhere) was also seen in the water and also drowned.
Who the third party was is still unknown. Johnson was the first member of the Air Transport Auxiliary to die in service. Her
death in an Oxford aircraft was ironic, as she had been one of the original subscribers to the share offer for Airspeed.
However, in 1999 it was reported that Tom Mitchell, from Crowborough, Sussex, claimed to have shot the heroine down
when she twice failed to give the correct identification code during the flight. He said: "The reason Amy was shot down
was because she gave the wrong colour of the day [a signal to identify aircraft known by all British forces] over radio."
Mr. Mitchell explained how the aircraft was sighted and contacted by radio. A request was made for the signal. She gave the
wrong one twice. "Sixteen rounds of shells were fired and the plane dived into the Thames Estuary. We all thought it
was an enemy plane until the next day when we read the papers and discovered it was Amy. The officers told us never to tell
anyone what happened."
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The 1930s were a decade of drastic changes and unforeseen hardships, a decade which turned millionaires
into paupers, and which utterly demolished the lifestyle of prairie farmers living in the ‘dustbowl'. The Dionne
Quintuplets became the obsession of a nation. Roller skates and miniature golf became full-fledged crazes, and 'talkies'
had more people than ever flocking to the theatre.
The stock market crash of October 1929 brought the economic
prosperity of the 1920s to a symbolic end. For the next ten years, the United States was mired in a deep economic depression.
By 1933, unemployment had soared to 25 percent, up from 3.2 percent in 1929. Industrial production declined by 50 percent,
international trade plunged 30 percent, and investment fell 98 percent. The Great Depression transformed the American political
and economic landscape. It produced a major political realignment, creating a coalition of big-city ethnics, African Americans,
and Southern Democrats committed, to varying degrees, to interventionist government. It strengthened the federal presence
in American life, spawning such innovations as national old-age pensions, unemployment compensation,, aid to dependent children,
public housing, federally-subsidized school lunches, insured bank depositions, the minimum wage, and stock market regulations.
It fundamentally altered labor relations, producing a revived labor movement and a national labour policy protective of collective
bargaining. It transformed the farm economy by introducing federal price supports. Above all, it led Americans to view the
federal government as an agency of action and reform and the ultimate protector of public well-being. The Great Depression
was steeper and more protracted in the United States than in other industrialized countries. The unemployment rate rose higher
and remained higher longer than in any other western country. As it deepened, the Depression had far-reaching political consequences.
Nazis lead in
German elections with 230 Reichstag seats. Famine in USSR. In U.S., Congress sets up Reconstruction Finance Corporation to
stimulate economy. Veterans march on Washington most leave after Senate rejects payment of cash bonuses; others removed by
troops under Douglas MacArthur. U.S. protests Japanese aggression in Manchuria. Amelia Earhart is first woman to fly Atlantic
solo. Charles A. Lindbergh's baby son kidnapped, killed. (Bruno Richard Hauptmann arrested in 1934, convicted in 1935,
executed in 1936.)
The 1930s were
described as an abrupt shift to more radical and conservative lifestyles, as countries were struggling to find a solution
to the Great Depression, also known as the World Depression.
The decade started off economically unsteady, with the
stock market dropping late in 1929. However, late in 1930, stocks and the economy dropped more, and this time it didn't
become better. Many people blammed then President Herbert Hoover for the things that were happing in the economy, along with
the GReat Depression. People began to feel the effects of the plunging stock market in 1931, and the situation grew progressively
worse until reaching the low point in 1933. The gloomy conditions that arose led to a rise of political extremes btween ultra-conservatism
and radical political particies. After 1933, the economy began a gradual recovery which wouldn't reach the level of prosperity
of 1930 until World War II. In both Central Europe and Eastern Europe, Fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism dominated as the solution
to these problems: the first two adopted war-oriented economic policies while the latter adopted sweepinf industrialisation
programmes such as Stalin's Five Year Plans, all of them described as totalitarian regimes. In East Asia, the rise of
militarism occurred.
In Western Europe, Australia and the United States, more progressive reforms occurred as opposed
to the extreme measures sought elsewhere. Roosevelt's New Deal attempted to use government spending to combat large-scale
unemployment and severely negative growth. Ultimately, it would be the beginning of World War II in 1939 that would end the
depression. According to
Nazi dogma, races could be scientifically classified as superior and inferior. The highest racial type was the Nordic, or
Germanic, type of the Aryan race, while blacks and Jews were at the bottom of the racial ladder. Intermarriage contributed
to the deterioration of the superior race, and the Jews, knowing this, had furthered prostitution and seduction to defile
the Germans. Consequently only small islands of the pure remained, but it was their destiny to govern their inferiors and,
through scientific breeding, to extend the master race and limit inferior races.
All Quiet on the Western Front is an Academy Award-winning film based on the Erich Maria Remarque novel All Quiet
on the Western Front. It was directed by Lewis Milestone, and stars Louis Wolheim, Lew Ayres, John Wray, Arnold Lucy and Ben
Alexander.
Released
in 1930 (see 1930 in film), it is considered a realistic and harrowing account of war and World War I, and was named #54 on
the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies. However, it was removed from the top 100 list in the 2007 revision. Also, in 1990,
this film was selected and preserved by the United States Library of Congress' National Film Registry as being deemed
"culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."
The end to the
Great Depression came about in 1941 with America's entry into World War II. America sided with Britain, France and the
Soviet Union against Germany, Italy, and Japan. The loss of lives in this war was staggering. The European part of the war
ended with Germany's surrender in May 1945. Japan surrendered in September 1945, after the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
The Nazis produced
a number of films to promote their views. Themes included the virtues of the Nordic or Aryan type, German military and industrial
strength, and the evils of the Nazi enemies. On March 11, 1933 The Third Reich established a Ministry of Propaganda, appointing
Joseph Goebbels as Minister of Propaganda. On September 22, a Department of Film was incorporated into the Chamber of Culture.
The department controlled the licensing of every film prior to production. Sometimes the government would select the actors
for a film, financing the production partially or totally, and would grant tax breaks to the producers.
Under Goebbels
and Hitler, the German film industry became entirely nationalised. The National Socialist Propaganda Directorate, which Goebbels
oversaw, had at its disposal nearly all film agencies in Germany by 1936. Occasionally certain directors, such as Wolfgang
Liebeneiner, were able to bypass Goebbels by providing him with a different version of the film than would be released. Such
films include those directed by Helmut Käutner: Romanze in Moll (Romance in a Minor Key, 1943), Große Freiheit
Nr. 7 (The Great Freedom, No. 7, 1944), and Unter den Brücken (Under the Bridges, 1945).
Triumph of the Will, by
filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl, chronicles the 1934 Nazi Party Congress in Nuremberg. It features footage of uniformed party members
(though relatively few German soldiers), who are marching and drilling to classical melodies. The film contains excerpts from
speeches given by various Nazi leaders at the Congress, including portions of speeches by Adolf Hitler.
Edward VIII,
1894 1972, king of Great Britain and Ireland (1936), known in later years as the duke of Windsor; eldest son of George V.
He attended the naval colleges at Osborne and Dartmouth and Magdalen College, Oxford. In 1911 he was made prince of Wales.
During World War I he served as a staff officer in France, Italy, and Egypt. Between 1919 and 1936 he made state trips to
the United States, Japan, South America, and the dominions. On the death of his father (Jan., 1936), Edward succeeded to the
throne. He enjoyed immense popularity with his subjects until the crisis precipitated by the announcement of his intention
to marry Wallis Warfield Simpson
Coal-mining reached a peak in Durham in 1923 when 170,000 miners were employed, but many industries
in the North-East experienced hard times in the 1920s and 1930s. Demand for industrial products was fading and the Great War
had provided only a temporary boost. In 1926 places like Middlesbrough had unemployment rates of 45 per cent. A worse situation
could be found at Jarrow in 1936 when there was 80 per cent unemployment. The men of that town set out on their famous 274
mile hunger march to London. The older industries still had a part to play - one of their great achievements was the building
on the Sydney Harbour Bridge in Australia - and new industries like plastic at Billingham were beginning to emerge.
What am I to do?
I cahn't help it.
Love's always been my game,
Play it how I
may.
I was made that way.
I cahn't help it.
— "Falling
in Love Again" by Frederick Hollander, Sammy Lerner
Marlene Dietrich sang this song for the first time in
Josef von Sternberg's "The Blue Angel," the 1930 German film that made her an international star and brought
her to Hollywood as Sternberg's glittering prot�g�e. In the film she plays a chanteuse named Lola Lola,
the star of a traveling variety show — though she might have been the lion tamer in a tent circus, with humans instead
of jungle beasts obeying the snaking whip of her gaze. Her wrought-irony smile suggested there was no depravity that she could
perform, no atrocity that could be performed upon her, that would shock or even divert her. Her body was open to all comers,
but her heart, if she had one, was encased in an invisible protective shield.
Lola Lola wears this smile, along
with a brimmed hat and a sleeveless sequined top, when she takes the stage toward the end of "The Blue Angel." Wrapping
her famous legs around the back of a wooden chair, she sings "Falling in Love Again" (actually "Ich bin von
Kopf bis Fuss/ Auf Liebe eingestellt": "From head to toe/ I'm made for love"). What siren power this song
and this singer have! They prod a stern schoolteacher, Prof. Immanuel Rath, to unbutton his inhibitions, renounce propriety,
propose marriage and become her crowing cuckold. All because he believed that Lola Lola was singing to him alone as her eyes
raked the room for contact with the customers. The Professor fell for the oldest, most seductive lie in show business: the
lie of intimacy.
Dietrich performed her signature tune thousands of times in her long career — many more
times, surely, than Judy Garland did "Over the Rainbow." But what do the lyrics mean? Who's falling in love
again? Not the singer. No, the tumbler is some man, any man, when he sees a woman like Dietrich. Though her presence warms
him, heats him, she does nothing overt to encourage him. ("You'd better go now," she tells Gary Cooper in "Morocco."
"I'm beginning to like you.") So she sings like a defiant defendant in the witness box. Not my fault, your honor.
Didn't start it. Cahn't help it. Why stop it? In matters of the heart and loins she was passive, a magnet aware of
and amused by its power of attraction. On this thrill ride she was simply the passenger, yet her presence drove men mad. As
mobster-on-the-make Cary Grant in "Blonde Venus" croons to her: "A little of you is worth a lifetime of any
other woman."
Civil Disobedience Movement launched
in 1930 under Mahatma Gandhi`s leadership was one of the most significant phases of India`s freedom struggle.
The Simon
Commission, formed in November 1927 by the British Government to chart and conclude a constitution for India and comprising
members of the British Parliament only, was boycotted by every section of the Indian social and political platforms, as an
`All-White Commission`. The opposition to the Simon Commission in Bengal was noteworthy. In disapproval against the Commission,
a `hartal` (strike) was observed on 3 February 1928, in several parts of the province. Widespread demonstrations were held
in Calcutta on 19 February 1928, the day of Simon`s arrival to the city. On 1 March 1928, meetings were held simultaneously
in all thirty-two wards of Calcutta, spurring people to revamp the movement for boycott of British goods.
Mahatma
Gandhi was arrested on May 5th, 1930, just days before his projected raid on the Dharasana Salt Works. The Dandi March and
the resultant Dharasana Satyagraha drew worldwide attention to the Civil Disobedience movement through widespread newspaper
and newsreel coverage. In fact, satyagraha was such a step towards the disobedience movement, that it came to synonymous with
Indian freedom struggle and non-violence. The satyagraha against the salt tax continued for nearly a year, ending with Gandhi`s
release from jail and negotiations with Viceroy Lord Erwin at the Second Round Table Conference. More than 80,000 Indians
were jailed as a result of the Salt Satyagraha. The crusade had a significant effect on changing British attitudes toward
Indian independence and caused huge numbers of Indians to aggressively join the fight for the first time. Sadly though, the
movement failed to win major concessions from the British.
The Salt Satyagraha campaign was based upon Gandhi`s
principles of non-violent protest called satyagraha, which he slackly translated as "truth-force." The Salt March
to Dandi and the flogging of hundreds of non-violent protesters in Dharasana, manifested the efficient use of civil disobedience
as a technique for fighting social and political injustice.
On 8th April 1929, members of the Hindustan Socialist
Republican Association detonated two bombs and fired revolvers in the assembly chamber of the Imperial Legislative Council
in New Delhi. In response, Lord Irwin published a Public Safety Bill which addressed the menace of the Communist Party by
deporting the Englishmen involved and taking legal action against the Indian membership.
Lord-IrwinOn 31st October,
Lord Irwin announced on behalf of the British Government that the natural constitutional progress of India was the attainment
of Dominion Status. The Viceroy did not name a specific time for the award. The Congress Party indicated its willingness to
cooperate in formulating a Dominion constitution as a test of the government`s sincerity which in the end proved minimal.
In November debates in both Houses, the measure was tacitly approved, but in such away that Congress rejected the Declaration.
On 23rd December, Indian nationalists failed in an attempt to blow up Irwin`s train.
On
23rd December, Lord Irwin met with Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964), Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (1875-1950), Mohammed
Ali Jinnah (1876-1948) and Tel Bahadur Sapru (1875- 1949) in New Delhi. Erwin however, could not arrive at an agreement for
framing a constitution under Dominion Status. The Congress also refused to attend the London Round Table Conference in London
due to communal division and the lack of British support for Indian freedom. At the ensuing 1930 annual meeting of the Congress
Party held at Lahore, the Congress declared itself for independence rather than Dominion Status and authorised a campaign
of civil disobedience.
On 12th March 1930, the Government of India allowed Gandhi`s civil disobedience movement
to proceed. It emerged as a march to Dandi on the sea, in protest to the duty on salt. On April 6th, Gandhi reached Dandi
and explicitly violated the salt law. In response, the Government of India arrested Jawaharlal Nehru on April 14.
On 18th April, amidst the turmoil of Indian life, approximately one hundred Indians attacked police and railway armouries
at Chittagong. They acquired a considerable cache of arms and ammunition. During the raid eight defenders were killed. Gandhi
condemned the raid which had made a deep impression throughout India. That liaison of the night, later came to be known as
the legendary Chittagong Armoury Raid Case.
On 5th May, following evaluation of the attacks and violence at Chittagong
and Peshawar, the Government of India had Gandhi arrested and lodged at Yervada Jail near Poona (present day Pune, Maharashtra).
His retention was justified under Regulation XXV of 1827, calling for the jailing of those engaged in unlawful activities.
Following Gandhi`s arrest, the British faced the full programme of civil disobedience as composed of Indian raids on salt
depots, disobedience of forest laws, refusal to pay taxes in chosen areas, boycott of foreign cloth and spirits and avoidance
of business with all British firms.
Jawaharlal-Nehru
On 30th June, the Government of India outlawed the All-India
Congress Committee and the Congress Working Committee. Congress President Motilal Nehru (1861-1931) was arrested with many
other Congress leaders. In a June 7 resolution the Congress called for all Indian police and military to disobey British orders.
On 23rd July, Lord Irwin facilitated visits to the imprisoned Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru by two Indian Liberals,
Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru (1875-1949) Mukund Ramrao Jayakar (1873-1959), for the purpose of determining ways to end civil disobedience
movement and to elicit Congress Party participation at a Round Table Conference in London.
On 25th January 1931,
Lord Irwin authorised Gandhi`s release from prison and withdrew proscription of illegality against the Congress Working Committee.
He hoped that through a personal appeal to Gandhi that progress could be made.
Between the period of 16th February
to 4th March 1931, Lord Irwin and Gandhi met in a series of negotiations seeking settlement of the issues emanating from the
civil disobedience movement. In the agreement reached on March 5, Gandhi agreed to discontinue civil disobedience as it embraced
defiance of the law, non-payment of land revenue, publication of news-sheets, termination of its boycott of British goods
and the restraint of aggressive picketing. The Government of India agreed to repeal ordinances opposing the movement and its
associations, to release Indian prisoners not guilty of violent acts, return fines and property as possible and to reappoint
Indians who had resigned their government posts if not subsequently filled. No material changes were made in the Salt Acts,
but exceptions in the case of local domestic manufacture and consumption excepted.
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