Chapter 20
Politics, Populists & Progressives
Electoral Politics after
Reconstruction
Waving the bloody shirt
Gilded Age
James Garfield (1880)
Assassinated by Charles Guiteau
Chester A. Arthur
Pendleton Act – Civil Service
Mugwumps
Elections of 1884 & 1888
Grover Cleveland v. James G. Blaine
Scandals & Mudslinging
Blaine implicated in RR scandals
Cleveland – first Democrat since CW
Vetoed individual Civil War pensions
1888 – Benjamin Harrison – Young Tippecanoe
Sherman Anti-Trust Act
Lodge Act –protect black voters - failed
Election of 1892 & Populist Party
1892 – Cleveland v. Harrison
Cleveland again –nonconsecutive terms
Rise of the Populist Party – 1892
From Farmers’ Alliances
Omaha Platform – James B. Weaver
Gov. ownership of RR & Telegraph – income tax
Mary “Yellin” Lease
“Sockless” Jerry Simpson
Politics in the 1890s
1893 – Economic Depression
Homestead & Pullman Strikes
Jacob Coxey – unemployed march
Jailed for walking on the grass
Silver & gold debate
Bought gold from J.P. Morgan
Democrats & “Solid South”
Tom Watson – urged unity among farmers
Williams v, Mississippi – literacy tests & poll taxes upheld
Convict lease system - expanded
Lynching – Center, TX
Election of 1896
William Jennings Bryan – Populists & Democrats
“Cross of Gold” Speech – endorsed silver
William McKinley – Republican
“Front Porch” Campaign
17 th Amendment – Senators chosen by popular vote
Lochner v. New York – bakers hours could not be limited
Reform Reshaped, 1901-1909
McKinley – 3.5 million to Bryan’s $300,000
Not a reformer – Gold Standard Act, 1900
Re-elected in 1900
Theodore Roosevelt – selected as VP
6 months after reelection – assassinated
Leon Czolgosz – anarchist
Raised immigration fears
Theodore Roosevelt
Born into wealth & privilege (1858-1919)
sickly child - Asthma
Father told him he must build his own body
Attended Harvard – on wrestling team
Prolific writer
Went into politics – 1 st wife & mother died
Went west – Dakotas
Returned to politics – married Edith Carow
Theodore Roosevelt
Gained fame during Spanish American Warr
Resigned as Asst. Secretary of the Navy
Rough Riders
Ran for gov. of New York – didn’t follow orders – reform
Hoped to end his career – as VP
Coal Strike of 1902 – nationalize
Elkins Act – RR had to publish rates
Northern Securities Case – 1 st time a corporation declared “in restraint of trade” (Sherman Anti-trust Act)
Theodore Roosevelt
Election of 1902 – Square Deal
President “in my own right”
Stepped up attacks on trusts
Hepburn Act – ICC could set shipping rates
Legacy led to case again Standard Oil et.al.
Environmental conservationist
Created wildlife preserves – 3 national parks
Antiquities Act – set aside Grand Canyon
Newlands Reclamation Act
Theodore Roosevelt
Contradictions – invited Booker T. Washington
Brownsville Incident - discharged 167 African
American soldiers at Ft. Brown
1972 – Nixon – gave honorable discharges & survivor awarded
$25,000 – Dorsie Willis
1908 – Roosevelt retired – but chose his successor –Wm. Taft
William Howard Taft
1904 – Roosevelt announced he would not run in 1908 – regretted it
1908 – picked his successor Taft (1857-1930) – been in his cabinet
1908 – ran against William Bryan – Taft won
Broke more trusts than Roosevelt but allied himself more closely with business
Liberal arm of Republican party revolted
Insurgents v. Conservatives
Roosevelt began to distance himself (went on safari to Africa – then returned to U.S. – soon he was siding against Taft’s policies)
Insurgent Republicans
Robert La Follette – gov. of Wisconsin (1901-06)– “laboratory” – U.S Senator
(1906-1925)
Wisconsin Idea – referendum & recall
Robert Hunter -poverty in cities – unjust social conditions – charities – limited
National Child Labor Commission – 1907
Children’s Bureau in Dept. of Labor – 1912
Muller v. Oregon – 1908 – limited working hours of women overturned Lochner - didn’t protect men
Brandeis brief – paved the way for social science research & 1910-1917 industrial states enacted insurance for on the job injury
Birth of Modern Civil Rights
W.E.B. DuBois – born in Great Barrington, MA (1868-1963)
1 st African American to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard
Taught at Atlanta U. – Prolific writer - 1 st sociological study of black Philadelphians, The Souls of Black Folk
Niagara Movement – DuBois & Wm. Trotter - 1905 – NAACP
Niagara Principles – full voting & civil rights
1908 – riot in Springfield, IL – led to est. of
NAACP - 1909– most of Niagara Movement joined DuBois edited The Crisis
Labor Issues
Western Federation of Miners – Big Bill Haywood
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW or “Wobblies”)
Ludlow Massacre
Bombing of the L.A. Times
Election of 1912
Theodore Roosevelt returned from Africa in 1910 – found party in disarray
Early in 1912 – declared himself a candidate for president
New Nationalism (anti-child labor, pro-woman suffrage & labor rights)
Went to the Republican National Convention – Taft emerged the candidate
Roosevelt - created a 3 rd party – the Progressive or
Bull Moose Party
Election of 1912 – 4 candidates
Eugene Victor Debs – led the Pullman Strike - head of ARU
once it was broken he went to prison – when he emerged he founded the Socialist Party of American
Democrats – nominated Woodrow Wilson
Program was called the New Freedom
Wilson won with 42% of the vote
La Follette continued to lead the Progressives
Woodrow Wilson
Born in Staunton, VA in 1856-1924
Came from a long line of Presbyterian ministers – sympathy with Confederacy
Earned a Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins U. – one of the first
Wrote a “tome” on American Constitutional History
Professor – became President of Princeton University
Reform governor of New Jersey - 1910
Economic Reforms
16 th Amendment – paved the way for an Income tax – a tax of from 1-7% on incomes of the rich – over $7,000 per year
Enacted the Underwood Tariff – lowered tariffs substantially
Inheritance Tax – 1913 – estates over 5 million – taxed at 40%
Federal Reserve Act (1913) – first efficient banking system
Federal Reserve Banks & a Federal Reserve Bd.
Could set interest rates & issue currency to stabilize economy
Clayton Anti-trust Act – strengthened the Sherman Act
Federal Trade Commission – investigate companies – decide what was illegal
Adamson Act – 8 hr. day for RR workers
Wilson’s Domestic Legacies
Many African Americans in the North had supported Wilson
Froze William Monroe Trotter out of his office in November 1914
Allowed re-segregation of government civil servants (separate restrooms and cafeterias
Had the racist film, The Birth of a Nation, showed over and over at the WH
Wilson & Woman Suffrage
Also refused to support woman suffrage
Allowed women to be put in prison & when they went
on hunger strikes they were force fed
Only after WWI and the publication of their abuse did he finally urge Congress to amend the constitution in 1919
19 th Amendment – passed in August, 920
Iron-Jawed Angels
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGyB3tV9kU0
Alice Paul & National Woman’s Party
