Ch 21
Politics: Local, State, and National
1. Why was the time period so turbulent?
2. Did farmers have a chance to be a serous player?
3. The populists were right. Do you agree?
4.
1870 – 1910 Time to dodge the BIG issues
City machines – loose knit neighborhood organizations
1. Ward bosses performed services for their “constituents” – new immigrants,
future voters
 Found jobs
 Distributed food
 “fixed” minor legal problems
 Provided for the homeless
 Birthday parties and Christmas for children
 Summer activities, games, picnics, boat rides
 Helped assimilate new immigrants
 Bosses WERE NOT reformers
 Primarily interested in maintaining and expanding their influence and power
 Directed their “constituents” for whom to vote in return Bosses receive
payment or kickbacks on building projects
 Boss Tweed – thrive because needy were largely ignored and left behind
o Bosses filled the need of the lower SES
Republicans v. Democrats
 Presidential politics
o South – Democratic/New England - Republican
o Primarily battle ground states: NY, N.J., Oh, In., and Ill.
o Elections and campaigns were big shows – bands, food, banners,
speeches
o Corruption was rampant – dead people voted
 Hayes (D) 1877 – 1881
o Very moderate
o Remain on gold standard, veto paper currency bills
o Opposed contributions form federal officeholders
o Took little action on increasing erosion of southern blacks rights
 Garfield (R) 1881 – 1885
o Rs split between stalwarts – want to continue spoils system and Half
breeds – less vocal but also wanted to continue system
o Assassinated July 1881 – angry political office seeker
 Chester Arthur (R)
o Pendelton Act – 1883
 Civil Service system
 Government jobs based on ability not who you know
 No forced political contributions
o Regulation of RR
 Grover Cleveland (D) 1885 – 1889
o Mugwumps – Rs who campaigned for Cleveland
 Benjamin Harrison (R) 1889 – 1893
o Favored protective tariffs
o Sherman Anti-Trust Act
o Silver Purchase Act – government coins silver money
o Force bill to protect black voting rights by Federal control of elections
 Cleveland Part II 1893 – 1897
Agriculture demise
 By 1890s farm prices in major decline
o Wheat from $1.50 in 1870 to .60 in 1890s
o Cotton from .30 in 1866 to .06 in 1890s
 Economic depression of 1893
o Over speculation of RR, land, and tight credit supplies leads to
major economic collapse
 In response – Populism
o Farmers organize
 Co-ops
 Buy seed in bulk
 Set prices for crops
 Attempted to negotiate transportation costs
o By 1892 farmers begin to win elections in many agricultural states
o R and D continue to ignore
o New party – Populists
 Farmers and industrial workers align
 Election of 1892
 Platform:
o graduated income tax
o national ownership of RR, telegraph,
telephones
o farm loan subsidies to farmers
o unlimited coinage of silver
o Initiative and referendums
o Direct election of senators
o 8 hour workday
 Not great success
 Failure to unite black and white
farmers; agricultural and industrial
workers
o Silver and gold
o Fed buys large amounts of silver to inflate its value
 1878 Bland Allison Act – Government buys $2 – $4
million/monthly
1890 Sherman Silver Purchase Act Government buys 4.5
million ounces/monthly amount of silver/dollar continues
to rise
 Depression of 1893 - over speculation of land, RR, and fear
of uncontrolled money supply
 Coxey’s Army – unemployed workers march on DC
demanding massive government spending onpublic works
projects
 Coxey arrested in DC, marchers dispersed
 Workers have little confidence in government heling
average citizen
 Pullman Strike put down with Federal troops
 EC Knight – Sherman Anti Trust not allowed to
break sugar trust
 SC allows Eugene Debs to remain in jail for
organizing RR strikes.
 1894 Gold supply falls as citizens turn in greenbacks
(paper) currency for Hard currency – gold
o 1895 JP Morgan “guarantees” US government money supply
 Fear that corporations and business now run government
o Populist continue to gain strength demanding silver as the
currency
 Rs go for gold standard nominate McKinley
 Ds for silver – William Jennings Bryan
 Gold East v. Silver West
 Gold industrialists v. Agriculture West
o Cross of Gold speech
 Ds nominate Bryan
o Populist dilemma
 Support Bryan and lose their individual power
 Run a 3rd party populist candidate – split D vote
McKinley (R) wins
o Election of 1896
 McKinley wins
 Bryan framed as a social revolutionary
o Populist could adequately unit N and S farmers or agricultural
west and Industrial workers in east
 Industrial workers pressured to vote for McKinley
 McKinley’s world view carries the day v. Bryan’s more
internal view
 Progressivism – regulate and reform
o Take on big business, corruption, improve working and living
conditions - return government to the people not special interests
or big business
o Take on slum conditions and child labor
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o
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
 1.7 million child laborers under the age of 16
Muckrakers – journalists who dug up dirt on politicians and
conditions
 Ida Tarbell, Lincoln Steffens
Very diffuse group with many different people/groups demanding
various and numerous reforms
 Had difficulty defining what reforms were necessary
Radical Progressives
 Eugene Debs socialist election of 1900, 100, 000
 Election of 1904 400,00 votes
 AF of L allows skilled and unskilled workers
 IWW – “Big” Bill Haywood
 Laborers and employers have nothing in common
Political reforms in cities
 Ward bosses lose power as appointed city managers take
control
Political reform in states
 Robert La Follette – Wisconsin Idea took on state level
political bosses/machines
 Grass roots organizing
 Direct primary
 Brought best and brightest into government
 Used commissions and agencies to regulate RR, road
construction, and tax assessment
 Initiative – allow citizens to put legislation on ballot
 Referendum – allow citizens to vote on legislation
Social reforms in states – States begin to take on big business
 Sweatshop regulation – conditions and hours
 Child labor issues – age and hour laws
 Mine regulation – safety
 Tenement regulation - safety
 14th amendment used to both enact and defeat social
reforms
 Women workers still fighting for voting rights
 Jacob Riis How the other half lives and Upton Sinclair The
Jungle
Women’s Suffrage NWSA
 Elizabeth Cady Stanton
 Susan B Anthony
 Carrie Chapman Catt
 Movement handicapped by infighting and continue leading
struggles for other reforms
 19th Amendment 1919
Income taxes and Direct election
 1913 16th Amendment Income tax
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1917 17th Amendment Direct Election of Senators
 Both Populist ideas from 1896 election
1918 18th Amendment Prohibition