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The Gilded Age: Searching for Order and Modernity Unit Objectives: We will explain the ways that new currents and processes, espoused, adapted and expressed by late nineteenth-century Americans on the topics of hierarchy, proper comportment, and social order acted as templates for present-day institutions and ideologies. Thesis: The newly-born moderate middle class and the more influential upper classes of the United States objected to power exerted by lowerclass and non-white individuals, but accepted coercion and systemic violence as necessary to create and maintain laissez faire and meritocratic order. Concepts: Golden Mean/Moderation Radicalism Laissez Faire Events: November 1887, Thibodaux May 1887, Snake River 1887 Dawes Act 1887 Hawai’i Constitution 1887, Lynchings of Mexicans in Texas Ideological Currents: republicanism racial consolidation Social Darwinism Middle-Class Respectability Urban reform Order and meritocracy Review: Precedents. Divide into groups of three. Use your notes to identify changes and continuities between these incidents of violence and dispossession and prior examples. Concepts: I. To consider: 1638 Pequot War, Paxton Boys, Blackhawk War II. Anti-abolitionist and antiCatholic riots III. Aftermaths of Haitian Revolution and Deslondes Rebellion I. We need to explain why there was such harsh violence. A. If Reconstruction ended in 1877, why were there massacres later? 1. There was a MUCH higher rate of violence in post-slave South than before. 2. B. Why? Blacks exert agency as soon as war starts [Black abolitionism], and into early twentieth century Thousands fled to Union lines when war starts A. Benjamin Butler, Fort Monroe – Slaves interact off of plantation B. Slaves in border states flee to union lines C. Slaves kept on coming even while Abraham Lincoln tried to get union commanders to return slaves, and exempt border staters Slaves spread ideas about Emancipation 3. Northern Blacks try to enlist in army before war starts A. Prohibited by law B. Post-1863, Over 70% of eligible blacks in North serve. C. Self-emancipated Southern blacks majority of blacks in uniform 4. Historians have shown that law and social reality different a. Literacy more pervasive than was legal i. Slave grapevine ii. Literate slaves open schools during war b. Slaves begin to seize land and organize agricultural production i. Slave men took family out of production ii. Slaveholders AND Union leaders wanted and legally compelled free African-Americans to raise cotton, some even on cotton plantations -. African-Americans resist -. Cotton production nonetheless halved. -. Start own schools and own businesses, vending made illegal. c. African Americans had politically and economically organized during war (Equal Rights Association, ) i. As Jacksonians, African-American demanded rights as citizens and those serving their country (If we can carry cartridges, we can carry votes) ii. African Americans, majority of soldiers occupying South Robert Smalls B. Southern Unionists and Democratic Repression 1. Scalawag was base of White Support; carpetbagger population very small a. Davis imprisoned, proportionally, as many traitors as Lincoln -. Would not give up privileges or control for war effort -. Yeomen began to fight against war, desert, and serve as guerrillas 2. Conservative White Southerners formed “rifle clubs” and associations a. Intimidated Republican voters/terrorism b. CSA officers like Nathan Bedford Forrest formed KKK, White Leagues/Lines c. Immense scale of terrorist violence i. Southern plantation owners resisted CSA state: i. Multiple terrorist massacres every month ii. African American soldiers formed Union league i. Armed resistance 4. Disfranchisement MOST intense after Reconstruction i. 1880-1901 – Poll taxes, literacy tests, grandfather clause E. Supreme Court 1. Civil Rights Cases—Unconstitutional, 1883 2. Plessy v. Ferguson – segregation, 1898 F. Enigma of Booker T. Washington 1. Founder of Tuskegee 2. “Atlanta Compromise” 3. The choice: “Confrontation or Accommodation.” 4. Opts out of political rights i. Politics of respectability 5. DuBois embraces respectability politics, but asks for citizenship G. Why is this important? A. Shows roots of African American resistance and Populist Movement B. Shows that politics and racism important issues: Civil War and Gilded Age A. Chinese Exclusion, 1882; Dawes Act, 1887 I. Post War America A. Rapid change in social and economic America 1.Emerging Middle Class, Corporate, and Agrarian Elites A. All equivalent: 8-hour day, Urban and rural Strikes, AfricanAmerican claims for justice and dignity, Paris Commune, Translation of Communist Manifesto, and Free Love. 1. Tired of sacrifice 2. Desire for material gain 3. Huge industrial growth a. Resources b. Expanding population and labor c. New scientific technology 1. Farm equipment 2. Industrial improvement B. Intellectual currents encouraged new behavior 1. Darwinian ideological adaptations a. Natural selection ordained inevitable progress b. All out competition allowed survival of fittest 2. William Graham Sumner-Social Darwinism- “Law of jungle applied to society” a. “Root, hog, or die” b. Competition is law of nature c. Nature’s process must continue without interference d. Meritocracy – revival of Weber’s idea of Calvinism – Circular – Good are best because they work hard e. Inequality always exist-poor always exist f. Still strong component of US ideology. Sumner 3. Laissez Faire results a. Laws of nature applied to society b. Businessmen accepted aid often c. Judiciary accepted Sumner 4.Laissez Faire and Meritocracy a. Northwest Ordinances, Land Offices, Expansion with Dignity, Louisiana Purchases, Patent Protection, Dartmouth v. New Hampshire, and chartering corporations i. Government guarantees property, through violence, and use of state power Ii. White franchise, antebellum development, and banking practices, US foreign activism (See Barbary Coast landings) iii. Femme Covert, Separate Spheres, and Republican Motherhood guarantee monopoly of public power by men - Certain nineteenth-century groups favored to secure rights. iv. Compare the gains from Dawes Act, treaty system, GI Bill, legacy admissions, Red-lining, housing covenants, Jim Crow, convict-lease, white primaries, and lynching. V. Why does laissez faire meritocracy require so much affirmative action? C. Politics in the Gilded Age 1. Many historians used to argue politics not important, but this opinion is being revised 2. Republicans in Reconstruction and Conquering the West 3. Party alignment a. Religion, geography, and race b. Issues 1. Bloody shirt 2. Tariff 3. Currency 4. Civil Service a. Patronage and corruption b. Crucial components of US political life since early republic c. Strong antebellum corruption, Buchanan (Civil War?) 4. The West a. Uninhabitable, 100th Meridian b. Yet, Thousands migrated i. 1879-1880, Blacks to Kansas (Exodusters) ii. Chinese to California, continuation of Gold Rush migration iii. RR brought 100,000 iv. By 1875, 1882, Chinese Exclusion Law 5. Native Americans in the West 1. Plains Indians a. Controlled 1/2 US in 1870 b. Long history of trade, bison hunting, and.5 Smallpox and the decline of the Comanche i. Women intermediaries and metis c. Two hundred years of adaptation to horse, as cavalry 3. “Concentration” in 1851 a. Defined boundaries-Sign treaties for each b. 1868 Ft. Laramie Treaty Exodusters 2. Government corruption--Indian Ring 3. Indian Wars-1860-1890 a. Sand Creek Massacre 1864, Cheyenne in CO i. Militia – Col. Chivington b. Piegan – 1870 – 200 Blackfeet in MT c. Camp Grant Massacre, 1871 – 144 Aravaipa/Pinal Apache in Southern Arizona – Multiethnic – Sam Hughes d. Lakota conflicts i. Little Big Horn 1876 ii. Gold in Black Hills iii. Thousands violate treaty iv. US unable to stop v. US asked NA to sell vi. Most sold-Sitting Bull refused Vii. Reservation - Ghost Dance Revival and Wounded Knee Massacre, 1890 – At least 200 Lakota Sioux dead Black Kettle 3. Nez Perce--Chief Joseph, 1877 a. Refused reservation b. Military tracked to Montana then Idaho 1. Canada and freedom 2. But Allies abandoned them 4. Geronimo, Chiricahua, and Western Apache, 1880s b. If you were asked the question: “What policy should America pursue regarding the Native Americans? What would you recommend? 2. How solve problem a. Dawes Severalty Act 1887 1. Encourage NA to accept Protestantism 2. Become Middle Class, taxes 3. Set standards for citizenship b. Phoenix Indian School, 1891 c. Shattered culture 3. Three effects a. RR kill buffalo b. Buffalo killed replaced by cattle c. Decline of Native American sustenance d. Native Americans did not disappear g. Theory on Expansion West 1. New Left a. Govt $ increased speed of genocide b. If Americans had used private money for RR, NA would have had 30 years to adjust 2. Neo Con a. Technology dominates b. Nothing would stop expansion. 3. Native American Historians and “New Indian Historians” a. Entanglement, not just victimhood and teleology 3 Third major issue ignored in late 19th Century: a. Environmental exploitation b. “The West is limitless”-Mining - First industry to attract people West 1. Prospectors created lawless boom towns [corporate] 2. Comstock - 1873-sold to syndicates 3. Population required statehood b. Land and Bonanza farms 1. Homestead Act disappointed many a. Poor could not move b. Speculators took most 2. Timber Culture and Timber Stone Act a. 320 acres for $2.50/acre b. Private companies took c. Individuals plant 80 acres of trees 3. Other problems hurt small farmer a. Drought b. Grasshopper 4. But Huge Bonanza Farms Grew (ND) a. Eastern corporations bought land i. Money for machinery ii. Run in military fashion iii. Labor from east iv. Got concession from RR v. Breadbasket of America vi. Exploited soil c. Cattle and Ranching exploited the West, adaptation from African, Mexican [1/2 nonwhite], and to a lesser extent, Anglo Southerners i. Settlers brought millions into open range after killing bison Urban population required meat “Cowboys made ‘long drive’ over Chisholm Trail to RR ii. Barbed wire introduced . Huge numbers required control . Barbed wire . Destroyed open range
