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Mobilizing a Majority: Nixon's “Silent Majority” Speech and the Domestic Debate over Vietnam

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 January 2017

SARAH THELEN
SARAH THELEN*
Affiliation:
Department of History, University College Cork. Email: [email protected].
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Abstract

President Richard M. Nixon and his staff intended his 3 November 1969 Address to the Nation on Vietnam to counteract the growing strength of the antiwar movement. Its appeal to a “Silent Majority” of Americans inspired an impressive outpouring of support, but this response owed as much to White House planning as to public opinion. Drawing on internal White House documents, this article traces administration efforts to secure this response and, then, to claim and promote this new Silent Majority. It demonstrates that White House public-opinion campaigns were designed to maximize control, and not necessarily to change attitudes.

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Articles
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Journal of American Studies , Volume 51 , Issue 3 , August 2017 , pp. 887 - 914
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press and British Association for American Studies 2017 

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References

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24 Ibid.

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52 Scanlon, 160.

53 Ibid., 190–91.

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75 Ibid.

76 Ibid.

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102 “Man and Woman of the Year: The Middle Americans,” Time, 5 Jan. 1970.

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