On August 6, 1945 the United States of America dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later another atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki, Japan. The events that led up to the United States' decision to drop the atomic bombs on Japanese cities is extensive, historical and political. President Roosevelt died, and Harry S. Truman took his place as President of the United States in April. The atomic bombs were being developed at this time as well, and in July the first one was successfully tested. It was necessary for the United States to publicly justify its use of the atomic bombs. Secretary of war, Henry L. Stimson, was chosen to write the article. In February 1947 the article, "The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb," was published in Harper's Magazine. Stimson constructed the article in a manner that would be consistent with American ideology and could be morally accepted by the American readers. Ideology provided the framework of the selected authors for analysis of Stimson's article. The specific ideology focused on is the ideology of post World War II America. This is the ideology in which Stimson's article "lived" in, and influenced his choice of rhetoric; the main focus of the analysis is Stimson's rhetoric. Identifying the elements of the text of the article and the ideological character of that text is key to understanding Stimson's choice of rhetoric. He asked this audience to accept certain points in order to justify the United States' use of the atomic bombs. He centered the article on themes such as American dominance, leadership, and moral and intellectual superiority; he used specific words and phrases to bring these themes to light. While Stimson's article was, and is, an important source of information there were many facts and events that he excluded from it to formulate the desired version of the justification. Possibly, the most prominent of Stimson's justifications for the use of the atomic bomb was this number of American lives saved. The analysis of this article and its findings are relevant in our understanding of political reporting of important events. The importance of understanding how and why Stimson used certain rhetoric to play to American ideological standards can help Americans today and in the future to better understand the portrayals of present day media coverage and political rhetoric. / Graduation date: 2003

published_or_final_version / History / Master / Master of Philosophy

Virtually all studies on the presidential use of metaphor focus on one particular event and speech. These studies look only at speeches that justify military actions after they have already occurred, and these researchers seek to discover a relationship between the use of the metaphor and the public's support of a military action. In order to analyze the persuasive elements of President Franklin Roosevelt's rhetoric in developing popular and Congressional support for war preparation, this study seeks to answer three specific questions. To what extent does Franklin Roosevelt develop a common theme in selected speeches of war preparation immediately prior to World War II? To what extent was Roosevelt's development of this theme persuasive to the American public? What consequences can be anticipated if future presidents or speakers for social movements employ these procedures.

While personal accounts and interpretive overviews have been written about the allied invasion and occupation of Italy during World War II, this study is the first to utilize recently published American Foreign Relations volumes dealing with the wartime conferences. Organized into five chapters, the study surveys allied conferences leading to the invasion of Italy, Italian political developments during occupation, and allied relief and rehabilitation efforts. The conclusions are that Churchill, while correct in .assessing Italy's strategic value, undermined his own policy through political meddling and a desire for revenge. In combination with Roosevelt, whose interest in Italy was political and at best marginal, Churchill needlessly delayed stabilization of Italian economic and political conditions.

Throughout America’s history the call for laborers has been filled by influxes of immigrants. Coinciding with the arrival of the first non-Anglo Saxon immigrants were negative attitudes about them, as they were deemed inferior and classified as lowerranking “others” by the dominant culture that needed them. Thus, the cycle of need and resentment was born to be repeated throughout the Nation’s history. In the first half of the twentieth century a shift occurred in American public perception of, and attitudes towards, immigrant groups including eastern European Jews, Italians and the Irish among others. This shift was marked primarily in terms of race: Some immigrants went from being considered black to white -- from illegitimate to legitimate by the dominant culture. One reason for the increased acceptance of these ethnic groups was a concerted campaign sponsored by the United States Government to promote an extended identity to groups that had previously been excluded from the mainstream. In particular, the goal was to create a sense of nationalism, or “Americanism,” among diasporic immigrant groups, thus encouraging their participation in the war effort. The result of such campaigns was a re-imaging of ethnic groups previously classified as non-white and a path to perceived whiteness, and thus inclusion, for them. These campaigns, formulated by the Office of War Information and executed largely by the War Advertising Council, led to a marked increase in acceptance for immigrant groups by the dominant culture. By examining social messages through visual cultural artifacts this study explores notions about race, ethnicity, whiteness and the role of communication theory and practices in constructing (imaging) an identity of otherness.” This study delineates the historical formation and subsequent partial de-construction (re-imaging) of negative depictions and some stereotypes of ethnic Americans. This research explores the sources of these attitudes and behaviors and how misconceptions, misrepresentations and centuries-old stereotypes of non-Anglo ethnic Americans have been fluid through changing social perceptions fueled, in part, by government interventions. / Includes bibliography. / Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2014. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

This thesis studies the Supreme Court decision, Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944) and its historical context, using a narrative perspective and reviewing aspects of narrative viewpoints with reference to legal studies in order to introduce the present study as a method of assessing narratives in legal settings. The study reviews the Supreme Court decision to reveal its arguments and focuses on the context of the case through the presentation of the public story, the institutional story, and the ethnic Japanese story, which are analyzed using Walter Fisher's narrative perspective. The study concludes that the narrative paradigm is useful for assessing stories in the law because it enables the critic to examine both the emotional and logical reasoning that determine the outcomes of the cases.