The Growth of the United States

Rural Republic to Urban State

1860 - 1900

Main Ideas

• The End of Reconstruction• The Growth of Industry and the Economy• Labor Movements• Urban Growth and Immigration• Changes in American Life• The West• Changes in Politics

The End of Reconstruction

• Who was Andrew Johnson?– Lincoln's successor– A disappointment to the Radical Republicans– A white supremacist– Full of contempt for Congressional initiatives– Replaced by Ulysses S. Grant in 1868

And the Reconstruction continues . . .

• Improvements in civil service and foreign policy

• No peace in the South, especially with the Klan

• Emergence of Carpetbaggers and Scalawags

• Grant won again in 1872, but was soon followed by economic panic in 1873

The End of Reconstruction

• Intimidation of black voters– Supreme Court

rulings did not help the matter

– The Election of 1876

– Democrat Samuel Tilden and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes

– Disputed returns

• The Compromise of 1877– Republicans agree to

help out the South financially

– Democrats agree to Hayes as President

– The Republican party collapsed and the Reconstruction ends.

The second half of the 19th century brought tremendous growth to the U.S.

economy

• Natural resources

• growing labor supply

• growing population

• capital

• new technology

• business friendly policies and practices

• talented business leaders

Laissez-Faire Economic Theories

• Social Darwinism– Charles Darwin’s

theories applied to capitalism

– The strongest and wealthiest would survive, the poor were disregarded

• Gospel of Wealth– To some, religion was more

convincing– application of Protestant

work ethic– Also believed that the

wealthy had a responsibility to be philanthropic to benefit society

– “God gave me my wealth”

• J.D. Rockefeller

Growth in Rail System

• Consolidation– Until the Civil War, sporadic, inefficient, and incompatible– Cornelius Vanderbilt - New York Central Railroad New York to

Chicago , 4500 miles of track• “trunk” lines

• Transcontinental Railroad– Congress gave authority during the Civil War– Divided between Union Pacific and Central Pacific companies– Irish, veterans and Chinese– May 10, 1869, golden spike at Promontory Point, Utah– By 1900, 4 more lines linked East to West

Expansion of Railroads

• Increase of miles of track x5 from ‘65-’00

• great impact on American life– market for goods – boost in other industries– 4 rail zones became 4 current time zones– modern stockholder corporation and complex

structure of business organization

Moving West

• Land Grants– subsidies in loans and

land grants

– 80 companies took 170 million acres of land

• sold extra land to settlers to finance construction

– value of government land increased substantially

The Good and the Bad

• Positive Consequences– railroads promoted western settlement– linked the East with the West

• Negative Consequences– poor construction, rushed– corruption– huge profits, government bribery Eliminated competition– regional monopolies established

• stabilized rates, reduced debts

• “The public be damned.”– Wm. Vanderbilt

Growth of Industries

• Shift from textiles and household production to industrial products– Steel– Oil, petroleum– Electricity

Henry Bessemer

• 1850s• air blown through iron

produces steel• Minnesota’s Mesabi

Range provided the start for this U.S. industry

Andrew Carnegie

• 1850s - poor Southern immigrant grew to superintendent of Pennsylvania R.R.

• 1870s - produced steel in Pittsburgh– outdid his competitors

in distance and technology

– “Vertical Integration”

Carnegie Steel

• By 1900, was top of the industry

• Carnegie retired to pursue philanthropy

• Sold for over $400 million to J.P. Morgan – became U.S. Steel

• 1st billion dollar industry and largest in the world

Oil

• Edwin Drake, 1859– 1st U.S. oil drilled in

Pennsylvania

• 1863 - J.D. Rockefeller founded a company that would eliminate all competition

J.D. Rockefeller

• Applied new technology and efficient practices to refineries

• company grew, cut prices and competition

• 1881 - Standard Oil Trust held 90% of market

Sherman Anti-Trust Act

• Prohibited “contract, combination, in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce” (1890)

• U.S. v E.C. Knight Co. (1895)– first challenge

– law would be applied only to commerce, not manufacturing

• Reforms would be strengthened under Progressivism

New Technology

• Samuel F.B. Morse (1844)

• 1866 - transatlantic cable

• Alexander Graham Bell (1876)

• by 1900, cables connected all continents in communication

Other Technology

• George Eastman’s Kodak Camera (1888)

• fountain pen (1884)• King Gillette’s safety

razor (1895)• Thomas Edison• George Westinghouse

Marketing Goods

• Needed ways to market products• R.H. Macy (New York) and Marshall Field

(Chicago)– places to shop in urban centers

• Frank Woolworth– chain retail

• Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward– mail order catalogs

Impact of Industrialization

• Concentration of wealth– Richest 10% controlled 9/10 of the nation’s

wealth

• Horatio Alger Myth– Novelist– Wrote about young men who through hard

work, luck and honesty could become rich

Discontent Among the Ranks

• While industries did offer opportunities for the growth of a middle class, 2/3 of all Americans worked more menial, low-paying jobs

• Skills were no longer valued• Conditions, whether in factories or on the

railways, were dangerous, unstable, and the compensation minimal

• The late 19th century saw a rise in unrest in these workers

Emergence of Labor Unions

• National Labor Union (1866)– Noted for its inclusion of women and blacks, though it

excluded Chinese– Significant victory was the 8 hour day, and worked hard for

social programs

• Knights of Labor(1869)– Led by Terrence Powderly– All inclusive– Advocated worker cooperatives, abolishing child labor, trusts

and monopolies– People turned away from the Knights after the Haymarket

Riot

Emergence of Labor Unions• American Federation of Labor (1886)

– Samuel Gompers– Directed local unions of skilled workers– Not inclusive of all workers– Worked for basic economic goals, not reform

• Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire (1911)• Haymarket Riot

– Among crowd were 200 anarchists– Violence broke out during a general strike in Chicago– Someone threw a bomb as police tried to break up the protests– Americans concluded that unions were radical and violent

The Business Response to Unions

• Lockouts - closing the factory to break labor movements before they can happen

• Blacklists - circulation of pro-union names• Yellow-dog contracts - agreement to not

join a union• Use of guards and militia• Court injunctions

Union Demonstrations of Power

• Homestead Strike (1892)– Carnegie’s Homestead Steel Mill near Pittsburgh– Response to cuts in wages by 20%– Strikers defeated after 5 months

• Pullman Strike(1894)– Response to wage cuts and firing of workers’

delegation members– Union boycott impacted lines across the nation– Supreme Court approved use of court injunctions to

make workers go back to work

Growth of Cities

• Product of Industrialization, changing economy• Poverty

– Tenements– Jane Addams and the Hull House– Salvation Army

• Skyscrapers, parks and public transportation– Reflects new use of resources (steel) in architecture, and the

transfer of changes in municipal politics

• Journalism– “yellow journalism”– Ladies Home Journal

Influx of Immigrants

• 1866 - 1915• Haven from persecution, poverty, blight, and

revolutions• Hope for prosperity and the American dream• Nativism

– Chinese Exclusion Act

– Gentlemen’s Agreement

Rise of Segregation

• “Jim Crow”• Lynching

– Between 1882 and 1892 more than 1200 persons lynched

• Lasting impact of Plessy case (1896)

• W.E.B. DuBois– NAACP

• Booker T. Washington– Importance of education

New Forms of Entertainment

• Vaudeville• Baseball• Amusement Parks• Newspapers and

magazines• Ragtime and jazz music• Nickelodeons and Movie

theatres built• Barnum and Bailey Circus• Buffalo Bill’s Wild West

Arts in the Gilded Age

• Literature– Mark Twain, Edward Bellamy and Stephen

Crane

• Architecture– Richard Morris Hunt, Henry Hobson

Richardson, Louis Sullivan

• Art– James McNeill Whistler, Mary Cassatt

Traditional Perspectives of the West

• Geography• Time• Appearance - myth vs.

reality

Three 19th Century Empires

• Mining• Cattle• Farming

Frederick Jackson Turner

• “Significance of the Frontier in American History”

• More than one “west”• Frontier means . . .• Democracy and

Individualism• Closure of West

“Cowboys and Indians”

• Cowboys– 35,000 men from ‘64-’84– 25% African American– 12% Mexican– 63% Caucasian

• Texas to Kansas

• Cooperation and Interdependence

Indians

• 1600s - 10 million estimated

• 1865 - 300,000– disease and warfare

• Most concentrated in West

Indian Policy

• Buffalo– 1865 - 12-15 million– 1885 - a few hundred remained

• Weaken tribes

• Bring more settlers, tourists West

• “Pacification”

Pacification

• 1874 - Comanche defeated at Red River Way

• Custer’s Last Stand

• 1877 - Nez Perce defeated

• 1886 - Apache defeated

• 1876 - 1890 - Sioux battle government

• 1889 - Wounded Knee

Dawes Severalty Act (1887)

• Imposed through the 1930s

• Make farmers out of Indians

• Acceptance = Citizenship

• Government remained trustees of land

• Hard to enforce

Changes in Agriculture

• Mechanization• New lands opened• Specialization of

products• Changes in the market

Lack of Control

• Business cycles

• Creditors

• Transportation

• Unreliable labor

• Price structures

• “laissez-faire”

To produce or not to produce . . .

• “We were told two years ago to go to work and raise a big crop, that was all we needed . . . and what came of it? Eight cent corn, ten cent oats, two cent beef, and no price at all for butter and eggs - that’s what came of it. Then the politicians said that we suffered from over-production.”

– John D. Hicks, The Populist Revolt

The “Agrarian Myth”

• Jeffersonian ideals• Superiority of farmers

in American society• Organizations formed

to reclaim that situation

The Grange Movement

• “granary”• Association founded

in 1867• Encouraged

supportive legislation• Encouraged

cooperation, community

Emergence of Political Organizations

• Farmers and Laborers’ Union of America

• Northwest Farmer’s Alliance

• Colored Farmers National Alliance

The Omaha Platform

• Permanent union

• Wealth for Workers

• Government owners of railroad

• Government ownership of communication systems

• Distribution of currency

• Owners of land must use it

Populism

• The People’s Party• anti-monopoly• denounced Social Darwinism and “laissez-faire”• Individual had become a commodity• Wealth unevenly distributed• Included farmers, laborers, and Socialists• Most came from the West or South

Populists Gain Prominence

• 1892 election– Republicans - 44%– Democrats - 47%– Populists - 9%

• Could have altered the outcome of election

• Became an issue to address by Democrats and Republicans in 1896

Panic of 1893

• Hurt the Democratic position

• Republicans rallied support and money for next election

• Voting was not secret yet, so this also impacted how voters performed at the polls

Election of 1896

• William Jennings Bryan

• “Cross of Gold” Speech– emotional speech became a rallying cry for

Populists– limited scope would limit his future

• William McKinley– “prosperity for all”