Industrialization, Monopolies,
Immigration, City Life and Rise of
Labor Unions
 Time
period after Civil War
• Made famous by author Mark Twain
 Time
of rapid industrialization,
immigration and changing city life
 Monopoly
• Definition- when one business controls the entire
industry
• Two types of monopolies
 Vertical Integration- person controls all factors of
production for one industry (used by Carnegie Steel)
 Horizontal Integration- person controls all
competition in the same industry (used by
Rockefeller Oil)
 Vertical
Integration
• When one company owns all factors of
production and can charge lower prices
• Example- Andrew Carnegie’s Steel Company
 Carnegie owned the iron mines, the shipping and the
steel mills
 He could charge less because he didn’t have to pay
the extra fees for using other companies
 Horizontal
Integration
• When one company completely controls an
industry by buying all competition
• Example- Rockefeller’s Oil Company
 Rockefeller would buy companies and give their
owners stock in his company
 Trust- group of advisors for a company (control and
set prices)
 John
Rockefeller- Oil
 Andrew Carnegie- Steel
 Cornelius Vanderbilt- Railroads
 JP Morgan- banks
Monopolies
Price Fixing
Eliminate Competition
Unfair treatment of
poor and middle class
 Captain
of Industry
• Owners praised for business skills and donating
back to society (Carnegie)
 Robber
Baron
• Owners who became rich illegally or unethically
and did not care about workers or society
 Theory
used by rich to defend their
wealth
• Based on Charles Darwin’s theory on survival of
the fittest
• Rich said they deserved to be rich because they
worked harder and were smarter than others
 Horatio Alger- wrote tales of underprivileged youths
who became wealthy through being honest and hardworking
SPAM-
 First Wave- 1820s to 1860s
• Mainly from Northern and Western Europe
• Scandinavia (Sweden, Norway), Ireland, Britain
• Example- Many Irish will come due to Potato
Famines
 Second Wave- 1890s to 1920s
• Mainly from Southern and Eastern Europe
• Italy, Russia, Hungary
• Seen as different- most are Catholic or Orthodox
religions, darker skinned, poorer classes
• Many Jewish groups for religious freedom
 Melting
Pot- immigrant groups give up
their own ethnic identity and blend into
one American identity
 Cultural Pluralism- immigrant groups
keep parts of their own culture and also
adopt parts of the American culture
 Nativism- groups that were antiimmigrant
• Chinese Exclusion Act- banned Chinese
laborers from immigrating to US until 1902
Melting
Pot
Theory
Chinese
Exclusion
Act
 Cities grow tremendously
• Known as urbanization (rapid growth of cities)
 Immigrants will settle in ethnic
neighborhoods
• Examples- Chinatowns, Little Italy, etc
 Most will live in tenement buildings
• One room apartments
• Overcrowded, dirty, no fire escapes, no
plumbing, disease widespread, unsafe,
unsanitary
 Jacob
Riis
• Write “How the Other Half Lives”
• Expose living conditions in tenements in NYC
 Jane
Addams
• Begin Hull House in Chicago
• Help poor immigrants learn English and other
necessities (money, etc)
 Most
immigrants work in sweatshops
• Little pay, long hours, dangerous conditions
 Response
• People band together to form labor unions
 Labor
Unions
• Fight for higher pay, better conditions and
shorter hours
• Most do not like immigrants because they work
for low wages
 Labor
Union- group of workers who
want to improve economic and social
well-being of its members
• Craft Union- organizes workers in the same
craft or occupation (Ex.- carpenters union,
brickmasons union)
• Trade Union- includes different kinds of
workers (Ex- Union for all building tradeinclude painters, builders, carpenters, etc)
 Early
Unions
• Knights of Labor- organized in 1869
 Will lose popularity after the Haymarket Strike
• American Federation of Labor (AFL)
 Craft union organized by Samuel Gompers
 Later led by Eugene Debs


Collective Bargaining- unions and management try to
negotiate on an acceptable contract
Strikes- workers stop working and try to shut down
company
• Scabs- during strike, company hire workers to cross strike lines and
continue working
• Injunction- court order to stop a strike

Mediation- if collective bargaining fails, a 3rd party will be
called to help settle differences
• Each side (labor and management) state their case and the 3rd party
gives recommendations
• Not binding decision

Arbitration- involves a 3rd party
• Each side states their case and 3rd party makes decision
• Decision made is binding and must be accepted
 Attempt
to address monopolies
• Sherman Anti-Trust Act- government outlaws
trusts
 Not very effective
 Political
machines and big city politics
• Machine- one group who uses bribes and
corruption to control government
 Ex- Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall in NYC
 Patronage- give government jobs based on political
support (spoils system)
• Pendleton Act- create a civil service system
 Civil Service System- government jobs given based on
merit (usually by taking a civil service test)
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