Immigration & the Political
Machine
Immigration
• Push Factor
Reason(s) to leave ones
birth country to live in a
foreign country
Get
out
• Pull factors
– Reason(s) a foreign
country inspires people
from their home country
Come
here
Steerage
• Why travel in these
conditions?
• Difficult & Expensive to
get to US
• What was the journey like
• Travel was basic, cheap,
crowded, miserable
• Filthy cramped living
conditions.
• Trip took 7 to 21 days
• RATS-LICE-Disease-Death
Ellis Island
• Processing center for immigrants New York harbor
• Frantic pace, Lost Identities, Health Inspections
How the Political Machine Worked
Political
Machine
supplies jobs,
food, clothes,
housing
Party boss
wins election
so he can
continue his
corrupt politics
Votes for the
party boss to
remain in
power
Urban Politics
• Cities grow faster than government
• Political Machine
– Informal political group
– Gain & keep power
– Got things for the working class.
• Jobs, homes, food, clothes, heat, protection, etc…
– Positive note
• Provided necessary services & helped assimilate the new city
dwellers.
• Party Boss received votes for Providing “things”
– Once elected used political power for greed.
• Grafts=getting money through dishonest or questionable means.
• Bribes
Tammany Hall
William “Boss” Tweed
• Tweed Courthouse
• One of the most
corrupt politicians in
history
– Grossly overpaid
contractors for work
• 13 million.
• 180,000(2.5mil) for 3
tables & 40 chairs.
• Imprisoned for
corruption. Died.
Urbanization: Ethnic Cities
Positives
Negatives
• Lived with similar
people who shared
• Slow to assimilate to
America culture
– Language
– Customs
– Culture
• Sense of Security
• Sense of Belonging
– Segregation led to violence
• Irish vs. Italians
• Polish vs. Russians
• Slow to learn ENGLISH
– Cant communicate
– Hard to find
• a job
• Basic needs
Urbanization
• Immigrants Lacked
– Money
• Cant buy land or
farms
– Education
• Forced to stay in
cities.
– Long Hours
– Little Pay
– Poor Working
conditions
Immigration
Old Immigrants N &
W Europe
Asians
European
Latin America
E. & S. European
New
Immigrants
S & E Europe
Nativist- English/Protestant descent
• Extreme dislike of foreigners
We were here
first…Protect the
American Worker
• Focused on
•
•
•
•
Jews
Catholics
E. Europeans
Asians
• Immigrants
• Worked for less money
• Were easily replaceable
• Had Communist & Anarchist
ideas
MARXIST
• Communism --> classless
society
• People
control
everything
• Inspires
Revolution
ANARCHISTS
• Anarchist
Immigrants = revolution,
communism,Anarchy
• No government
• Inspires
Revolution
Nativism
• Labor Unions antiimmigration
• Anti-Immigration Org
• American Protective
Association
• Workingman’s Party of
California
• Chinese Exclusion Acts
• Banned for 10 years
Urban American Social Issues
•
•
•
•
•
Immigration
Urbanization
Gilded Age
Social Darwinism
Early Reform
Gilded Age
• Coined by Mark Twain
• Gilded = Covered in Gold
–
–
–
–
New Inventions
Skyscrapers
Electricity
Great wealth
• Covered
–
–
–
–
Poverty
Crime
Corruption
Gap between rich and poor
GILDED
AGE
Urban Problems
• 4 Major Problems:
– Overcrowding
– Crime/Violence
– Sanitation
– Political Corruption
Urbanization
• Cities
– Overcrowding
– Plumbing
– Running water
– Electricity
– Cultural Centers
• Museums
• Libraries
• Theaters
Ethnic Cities
• Gangs & Crime
• 5 points
- Promotes hostilities
between other
ethnicities & natives.
Class Division
• High Society
– Wealthiest Families
– Lived in the heart
of the city.
– Extravagant homes
• Moved to the
outskirts to avoid
overcrowding….This
happens again in
the 1940s and 50s
Class Division
• Middle Class
– Doctors
– Lawyers
– Teachers
– Architects
• “streetcar
suburbs”
Class Division
• Working Class
– Tenements
• Unsanitary-diseases
• Crowded- many families share
housing
• Dangerous-crime, alcohol, gangs
• Herbert Spencer
– On the Origins of
Species by Means of
Natural Selection”
– Natural Selection –
plant and animal
evolution (survival of
the fittest)
• Social, Political &
Economic issues
– Laissez-faire
• Rockefeller
– Standard Oil
– “I am rich because I am
Social Darwinism
Individualism
• Belief that despite
their origins, one
could rise to as far as
talent and
commitment would
take them.