Unit 6: 1865-1898, Westward expansion, gilded age

• Gilded Age


  defined by technological innovation, mass immigration, disputes over currency, tariffs, political corruption, and railroads and business trusts
• Businesses looked beyond borders for markets - Asia
• There was a growing gap between the rich and the poor
• Subsidies fueled westward expansion (railroads)
• Monopolies


  Emergence of monopolies for businesses to gain powers and resources, lack of competition through vertical/horizontal integration
• Social Darwinism


  Used by wealthy to defend their successes, survival of the fittest. If you are rich and wealthy, you deserve to be. If poor, work harder
• Workforce during the Gilded Age

  • More farmers moving to cities for jobs, leads to lower wages + increase in child labor
  • Unions sought better working conditions and wages
• Knights of Labor (KOL)


  Skilled and unskilled workers, didn't last long because of Haymarket riots and got a bad name which quickly led to the KOL being dissolved
• American Federation of Labor (AFL)


  Only skilled laborers, much more successful
• New South


  People thought that the South should be industrialized, happened in some areas but sharecropping and tenant farming still persisted
• Corporations


  Battle over natural resources and land with conservationists, i.e. Sierra Club which sought to protect many areas of the environment
• Farmers sought to limit the effects of mechanized farming (which displaced a lot of farmers) and dependence on railroads
• The Grange


  Organization of farmers who sought to regulate railroads and grain warehouses. Not as successful
• Populist Party


  represented the interests of farmers, many struggles: the mechanization of agriculture drove crop prices down, unregulated railroads charged high rates, and protective tariff helped industry, not farmers.

  
  

  called for railroad regulation, land reform, and government-backed loans. most important = free silver. wanted to coin silver to increase money supply and promote inflation.
• Omaha Platform


  Election of senators, income tax, regulation of railroads
• New Immigrants

  • Southern/eastern Europe, Italy/Poland. Settled in cities, boomtown areas of the West. Heavily discriminated against by the APA (anti-Catholic, similar to the Know-Nothing Party)
• Characteristics of Cities

  • Divided ethnically, racially, and economically. Immigrants tended to settle in the same area. Little Italy, Chinatown, etc.
  • Provided jobs in factories to large numbers of women, immigrants, and African Americans
  • Emergence of political machines, Tammany Hall. Provided social services in exchange for political support
• Settlement Houses

  Jane Addams Hull House, helped immigrants and women transition to urban life
• Transcontinental Railroad


  • Westward settlement post-Civil War, many migrated due to economic opportunities or government policies (Homestead Act, subsidies, etc.)
• Treaties with natives were often violated. Lots of violence and conflict often occurred between settlers, natives, and Mexican Americans
• Government's Response to Native Resistance

  • Military force - Chief Joseph, Custer's Last Stand, Wounded Knee (1890)
  • Placing natives onto small reservations and changing their identities through assimilation
• Chief Joseph

  Lead the Nez Perce during the hostilities between the tribe and the U.S. Army in 1877. His speech "I Will Fight No More Forever" mourned the young Indian men killed in the fighting.
• Custer's Last Stand/Battle of Little Bighorn

  George Armstrong Custer lost every soldier in his unit. Native American forces defeat the U.S. Army troops. Proved to be the height of Native American power during the 19th century.
• Wounded Knee

  Marks the grim conclusion of Native American armed resistance in the West, a massacre of Lakota Sioux by U.S. troops
• Ghost Dance Movement


  Involved a set of dances and rites that its followers believed would cause white men to disappear and restore lands to the Native Americans.
• Dawes Act


  Break up reservation land to be parceled out to individuals
• Gilded Age Politics

  • Focused on economic issues - tariffs, gold v. silver, laissez-faire policies, etc.
  • Government corruption called for many to seek reform at the local, state, and national levels
• Interstate Commerce Act


  Created to regulate railroads, more symbolic at first.
• Increase in Nativism and Racism


  • Plessy v. Ferguson, Chinese Exclusion Act, American Protective Association
• Chinese Exclusion Act


  Banned Chinese in 1883 from emigrating to the United States
• Plessy v. Ferguson


  SCOTUS upheld Jim Crow laws, separate facilities are okay as long as they are equal
• Intellectual Movements


  • Gospel of Wealth
  • Social Darwinism
  • Social Gospel
• Gospel of Wealth


  Written by Carnegie, urged the wealthy to donate money
• Social Gospel


  Protestant church movement to improve cities and lives of the poor
• Booker T. Washington

  Encouraged vocational training, believed that African Americans should focus on economic gain to achieve political equality. Accept segregation temporarily, would go away on its own.
• W.E.B. DuBois

  Believed black people must demand equality and integration now, not later. Favored protest and higher education
• Ida B. Wells

  Outspoken critic of lynching in the South
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton

  Advocated for women's suffrage
• robber barons


  Corporate bosses pursuing unethical and unfair business practices aimed at eliminating competition and increasing profits. Factory workers were subjected to brutal and perilous working and living conditions.