The American Dream in the 21st Century

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION The Making and Persistence of the American Dream John Kenneth White Sandra L. Hanson T HE AMERICAN DREAM remains a vibrant concept that Americans comprehend and define in various ways as relevant to their own life experiences. The endurance of this “great epic,” as it was once so famously described (Adams 1941, 405), is remarkable, especially given the depressions, recessions, economic contractions, and battles over civil rights, women’s rights, and gender equality that the United States has witnessed over the years. These economic struggles have been hard and are presently ongoing, starting with the severe economic downturn that began in December 2007 and resulted in government bailouts of the U.S. banking and automotive industries and the election of Barack Obama to the presidency, all before the end of a single calendar year. But other struggles, too, have caused citizens to redefine the American Dream. For much of our history, African Americans and women were excluded from its promise. It would be left to Martin Luther King and feminist leaders to enlarge the American Dream to include themselves and to encourage their constituencies to have a stake in its success. In 2008, Americans voted in their first African American president. This dramatic moment in American history combined with one of the most severe economic downturns since the Great Depression provide the backdrop for this volume on the American Dream. The American Dream throughout History The resiliency of the American Dream can be traced to the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and its promise that citizens of the new nation 2 ■ John Kenneth White and Sandra L. Hanson were already endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, including life and liberty, and that these same people were entitled to engage in many varied pursuits of happiness. These pursuits of happiness often ended with many finding some degree of fulfillment. Writing in 1831, Alexis de Tocqueville declared that the Americans he encountered had “acquired or retained sufficient education and fortune to satisfy their own wants.” Tocqueville added that they “owe nothing to any man, they expect nothing from any man, they acquire the habit of always considering themselves as standing alone, and they are apt to imagine that their whole destiny is in their own hands” (Tocqueville 1989, 194; emphasis added). These sentiments give the American Dream its staying power. Not surprisingly, Americans have looked to their leaders since the nation’s founding to reaffirm the promise of the American Dream, with its guarantees of fuller liberties and a better life for all. In his 2009 inaugural address, Obama gave testimony to the Dream’s endurance, citing his own life’s journey to become the first African American president: “This is the meaning of our liberty and creed, why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall. And why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath” (Obama 2009). Yet it is not only in government documents or presidential speeches that the American Dream finds expression. The popular culture also has given the American Dream a powerful voice. Contrasting his gritty childhood in Brooklyn at the turn of the twentieth century with his stunning success on Broadway by the age of twenty-five, playwright Moss Hart concluded that the American Dream belonged not only to him but to everyone: “It was possible in this wonderful city for that nameless little boy—for any of its millions—to have a decent chance to scale the walls and achieve what they wished. Wealth, rank, or an imposing name counted for nothing. The only credential the city asked was the boldness to dream. For those who did, it unlocked its gates and its treasures, not caring who they were or where they came from” (Hart 1959, 436). Years later, the Brian De Palma film Scarface had a trailer describing the main character this way: “He loved the American Dream. With a vengeance” (Kamp 2009). Surprisingly, the term “American Dream” is of relatively recent vintage . Journalist Walter Lippmann first used the term “American Dream” The Making and Persistence of the American Dream ■ 3 in a 1914 book titled Drift and Mastery in which he urged readers to find a new Dream for the twentieth century that would end the malaise of government inaction that had allowed American politics to aimlessly drift...