Chapter 23

Politics in the Gilded Age

The “Bloody Shirt” Elects Grant

Americans disillusioned among idealistic

Got corruption, petty politics, and Grant

General would make a good president

Most popular war hero after the WarGiven lavish gifts like they owed him

for saving the Union

Not up to the political arenaNot very cultured

1868 Republican Platform

Continued reconstruction of South“Let us have peace” -Grant

Democratic Convention

Denounced reconstructionRepudiationForced through the Ohio Idea

-Redemption of bonds in greenbacks in fullDemocrats hope to keep money in

circulation to make loans affordable

Heratio Seymour - New York Governor

Denounces repudiation

Republicans wave the “bloody shirt”

“Vote as you shot”

Grant 214-80

Popular vote by only 300,000Majority of whites vote for SeymourTexas, Virginia, and Mississippi not

counted500,000 former slaves votes carry

Grant into office

Era of Good Stealings

Population growing by leaps and bounds

Becomes third largest western nation behind Russia and France

39 million

America is going to be full of graft and corruption

Railroad promoters left bond buyers with little success

Judges and legislatures were up for hire

Jim Fisk and Jay Gould

High living and showy millionaire Wanted to corner the gold market

1. Bought up gold 2. Convinced Grant not to sell gold 3. Took prices high 4. But Grant released gold anyway,

knowing the scheme

Jim Fisk

Tweed Ring

New York CityMilked city and state of over $200

millionAddition, division and silence

Thomas Nast

Cartoonist who helped bring down Boss Tweed

Turned down much in bribes

(example of a political cartoon)

Samuel Tilden headed prosecution

Tweed found guilty and sent to jail

A Carnival of Corruption

Grant Administration full of corruption

Except for Hamilton Fish - Secretary of State

In-laws are even a part of the graft

Credit Mobilier

1. Railroad Construction Company formed by insiders of Union Pacific

2. Hired themselves and paid themselves hefty sums

3. Distributed shares to Congressmen

Uncovered in 1872Tow Congressmen censuredVice President had even received

shares in stock

Whisky Ring

1. Robbed Treasury of millions by bribing tax collectors

2. Grants private secretary involved Grant gets him off

William Belknap

Made money by selling privileges of selling junk to Indians

The Liberal Republican Revolt of 1872

Liberal Republicans

Reform minded citizensWant to purify Washington and end

reconstruction

Nominated Horace Greeley for president

Reform journalistNot a good politician Eccentric who was hostile to Democrats Got Democratic nomination to run

against GrantWants to clasp hands across the “bloody chasm” and brought Democrats on his side

1872 Election

Two candidates not qualified for the job

Campaign becomes one of name calling

Wave bloody shirt and wave dirty shirt

Grant wins againGreeley lost election, job, mind, life

within a month

Liberal Republicans force changes

1. General amnesty for former Confederate leaders

2. Lowered high Civil War tariff3. Mild civil service reform

Depression and Demands for Inflation

Panic and Depression of 1873

Promoters overextended and markets could not keep up

Bankers made too many bad loans

Jay Cooke and Company

Made loans hoping Europe would help out, but Europe experiences its own depression

Financier of the Civil War went bankrupt

15,000 business go bankrupt

Labor riotsBlacks hit hardest - lost savings

Debtors want inflationary policy

1. $450 million greenbacks still in circulation

2. Money losing value to gold3. Want cheap money to ease debts

Creditors want hard money to keep its value

Resumption Act of 1875

Grant convinced to print more paper money

Redeem at face value in gold Saw greenbacks taken out of circulation Fueled depression

Silver

Debtors look for relief from silver 1. Silver worth 1/16 of gold by Treasury

Dept 2. Silver miners stopped selling silver to

government 3. Treasury stops minting silver 4. Silver discovers drive price down

even further

Crime of 73

Westerners and debtors call for more greenbacks

A call for inflation

Contraction

Government collecting money to redeem greenbacks in 1879

Amount of money per capita decreased

Worsened the depressionRestored US credit rating Brought greenbacks up to face valueFew redeemed in 1879

Bland Allison Act

Compromise between sound money and soft money

Instructed Treasury to buy $2 to $4 in silver each month But they buy only minimum

Backlash

Democratic House in 1874 and 1878Beginning of Greenback Labor Party

Pallid Politics in the Gilded Age

Political seesaw in the late 19th Century

Presidential races closeMajority in House and Senate never

the samePoliticians not willing to take bold

stands Trivial and petty

Democrats and Republicans see eye to eye on most

issues

Fighting became fierceEfficient organizationsRecord voter turnoutsMany voted straight party ticket

Why political consensus and political fighting

Built along ethnic and cultural differences Republicans

Lineage to PuritansGovernment should play a role in economic

and moral affair

Democrats Immigrants, Lutherans, CatholicsMore tolerable of differencesOpposed government touching morality

Bitter politics at local level also

Democrats

Solid base in SouthRan well in northern industrial cities

Immigrants and political machines

Republicans

MidwestRural and small towns which usually

gave them victoryFreedmen voted RepublicanGAR - Grand Army of the Republic

Potent political block

Patronage

Parties built support on patronage and spoils of office

Infighting in Republican Party in 1870s and 1880s

Stalwarts - Roscoe Conkling - New York Senator Embraces spoils system Portrayed as a turkey

Half Breeds - James G. Blaine - Maine Toyed with civil service reform but

really wanted power in party to hand out spoils

Blaine wanted to be president Played both sides to appeal to all

Wave bloody shirt and twist British lion’s tail

Worked in stalemating eachother

The Hayes-Tilden Standoff, 1876

Grant wants to run but many remind him of the two turn tradition Grant out of the running

Rutherford B Hayes

Compromise candidate between Stalwarts and Half Breeds

War veteranCame from Ohio

which was important in electoral college

Samuel Tilden

DemocratCivil Service reform

and against Republican scandal

Had 184 of 185 needed to win election and 247,000 more popular votes

Louisiana, South Carolina, and Florida sent in two sets of presidential voting returns Who should count the returns in

Congress Which do they count

The Compromise of 1877 and the End of Reconstruction

Both sides working on compromise in tradition of Clay

Electoral Count Act

1. Commission to count returns2. 15 from Senate, House, and

Supreme Court3. Tried to make it even and one

bipartisan - David Davis of the Supreme Court

4. Davis resigns and runs for Senate

Commission accepts Republican returns 8-7 along partisan lines for all 3 states

Compromise of 1877

1. Hayes takes office2. 15 from Senate, House, and

Supreme Court3. Tried to make it even and on

bipartisan-David Davis of the Supreme Court

4. Bill for Texas pacific railway Not all these promise kept

Deal completed only 3 days before inauguration

Deal broke standoff

Compromise at a Price

Violence averted by sacrificing black freedmen

Republicans abandon black equality

Civil Rights Act of 1875

Last feeble attempt at equality by Republicans

Give equal accommodations in public places and no discrimination in jury selection Law toothless

Civil Rights Case of 1883 says most of it is unconstitutional

Court says individuals may discriminate

Hayes appoints former Confederate to postmaster general

Hayes also withdraws last troops from South Republican governments in South gone

Democratic South soon move whites back into power Blacks disenfranchised

Threatened with unemployment, eviction, violence

South also institutes poll taxes and literacy tests

Make blacks economically dependent

Forced into sharecroppingCrop lien system kept blacks forever

in debt to masters

Jim Crow Laws

Moved from informal separation of races to state-level legal codes of segregation

Plessy v. Furgeson (1896)

Separate but equal facilities were legal

Segregated in all areas of life and education

South dealt harshly with any who challenged “new order”

Record number of lynchings Crimes against whites asserting themselves

Class Conflicts and Ethnic Clashes

Class warfare begins

Depression and deflationRR decide to cut wages 10%

StrikesGets working class supportWork stoppage

Weakness of Labor Movement

Chinese came to California Dig in gold fields Lay railroad 9% of population Left country with little money

Those who stayed were marooned Neither wanted now where they wanted to

be Children begin to assimilate

Dennis Kearny

Sand Lot IncidentLed violence against Chinese in San

Francisco Resent the competition of cheap labor Coolies a menace Kearnyites terrorized the Chinese

1879 Congress restricts Chinese influx

Hayes vetoes bill Angers Californians

1882 Passes when Hayes leaves office

Chinese Exclusion Act stays until 1943

Cold Water gets Cold Shoulder

Hayes begins with cloud over Presidency

Old 8 to 7His FradulencyTemperance in the White HouseLemonade Lucy Hayes

Accomplished little as President

Finished Reconstruction1880 Election-Hayes out

Garfield Interlude

James A. Garfield - Ohio

Stalwarts and Half Breeds deadlocked

Dark HorseCivil War Officer

Chester A. Arthur

Stalwart henchman for VP

Platform

Protective TariffFeeble Civil Service Reform

Democrats

Winfield HancockCivil War GeneralPopular in South

Platform

Civil Service ReformRevenue Tariff

Campaign

Avoided controversyRepublicans-wave bloody shirt

Gave money to Indiana to sway votersDemocrats-discredit Garfield and

bring up Credit Mobilier

Garfield 214-155

Patronage

Blaine becomes Secretary of State Tries to clip wings of Stalwarts

Charles Guiteau - kills Garfield

Sept 19, 1881Office seekerStalwart Insanity defense

does not workHung

Garfield

MartyrShocked public servants into action

against flagrant abuses of patronage

Chester Arthur takes command

Little qualifications to become President

Spoilsman in Conklings New York political machine

Underestimated at first

Prosecuted post office frauds“Owes VP to Conkling but President

to Almighty”

Begins to support civil service reform

They had lost the House in 1882Felt it would get worse if they did not

reform

Pendleton Act of 1883

Magna Carta of Civil Service1. Prohibited financial assessment of

job holders2. Merit system to office

appointments based on test3.Set up Civil Service Commission to

administer the tests

Arthur supports the Pendleton Act

Government begins classifying jobs

Problems of Civil Service Reform

1. Put good jobs beyond patronage and politicians

2. Turned to big corporations for money New breed of boss who could get money

for the party from lobbyists and corporations

Arthur turned out in 1884

Even though a good reformUpset Stalwarts

Blaine Cleveland Mudslinger of 1884

Blaine gets Republican nomination

Tattooed manMulligan Letters

By Blaine to a Boston businessman linking him to a corrupt deal involving federal favors to southern RR

Mugwumps

Republicans that join the Democratic side

Democrats-Cleveland a noted reformer

Lawyer-Governor of New YorkAmericans hungry for good character

Republicans

-Find Cleveland had an affair with Albany widow with illegitimate son Democrats demoralized Cleveland decides to “Tell the Truth”

Low Level Campaign

Few fundamental differencesFocused on personalities

Election may hinge on New York

Republican clergy labels Democrats as party of Rum, Romanism, Rebellion This insults the Irish voters Blaine does not speak out against this RRR is stuck to Blaine

Cleveland wins 219-182

Public dishonesty vs. private immorality

Mugwumps and New York were Blaine’s downfall

Old Grover Takes Over

First Democrat in over 28 years

Could the Democrats be trusted to govern?

Cleveland does not work well within his party

TactlessInsulting

Gave in to patronage

Fires 2/3 of 120,000 federal employees

Including 40,000 Republican postmasters

Military Pensions

Loopholes in bill spur graft and waste Fraudulent claims Congressmen introduce special bill to

end these loopholes Handouts to deserters, bounty jumpers

and men who never served

Cleveland vetoed these special bills

Challenging the GARCleveland a non veteran

Cleveland Battles for a lower Tariff

High tariff during the Civil War

Revenues for American militaryAmerican industry profitsTreasury running a surplus of $145

million- mostly from the tariff

1. Given surplus to veterans Would build up voting support

2. Lower the tariff - industrialists would dislike

Cleveland studies the issue

Likes lower tariffs Lower prices Less protection for monopolies Lessen the surplus

Overdoes it

Cleveland asks Congress for a lower tariff

Issue becomes national importanceRepublicans rejoice at recklessnessDemocrats depressed by

recklessnessIssue for 1888 campaign

Harrison Ousts Cleveland in 1888

Democrats nominate Cleveland reluctantly

Republicans nominate Benjamin Harrison

Campaign

Cleveland had marries young Accused of beating wife

Tariff prime issue

Did lower tariff mean a vote for England?

This issue was pushed by Republicans

Republicans begin lining up votes for Harrison against the low tariff Build war chest Buy votes if they have to

Harrison wins electoral vote but loses popular vote

Cleveland first sitting President to be ousted

Achievements

Dawes Act-designed to control Indians

Interstate Commerce Act-designed to curb RR

Retrieved 81 million acres of land for the government out West

Tied down by politics of the times

One of the forgettable presidentsCongress overshadowed the White

HouseLocal politics shown bright alsoCleveland a bright but dim star

during this time

Most able men attracted to industry where the money was