The Gilded AgeDr. John Holmes

U.S. History After 1877, History 121,

Diablo Valley College San Ramon

Summer 2013

The Transformation of America Before 1877, America a rural nation After 1877, America industrializes,

urbanizes, and immigrates This class: industrialization

1865-1920: Population increases 300% Manufacturing 1000% GNP per capita more than 300%

America before 1877 The First Industrial Revolution

Centered in New England Iron railroads in North Small factories, individual owners Railroad companies, state not

federal subsidy Millionaires and big businesses

few and far between But by WWI, U.S. Steel the biggest

company in the world

The Corporation Sale of stocks means:

Separation of ownership and control

Stockholders vs. management Key role of banks as financiers

From free competition to monopoly Henry Demarest Lloyd, doc. 18-3

Railroads: the first big corporations

The Robber Barons Symbols of the Gilded Age Widely hated:

By laborers; By farmers; By small businessmen

Jay Gould

Most hated man in America Grant Administration scandals His own views: doc. 18-1 Robert Ingersoll on Gould Sayings:

I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half.

The effect of this policy will be to anni-hilate the Indians & so greatly benefit us.

Andrew Carnegie

Richest man in world. Gould’s opposite. Doc. 18-4

Brilliant businessman Price of steel: $126 a ton in 1864,

less than 20 in 1890s Steel empire founded on rails for

railroads Gave it all away

Carnegie Institute

Corruption of the Gilded Age Government favoritism to business Railroads and the Homestead Act The lobbyist: free rail passes Where to draw the line? The bank bailout

Government before the Civil War Federal Government barely existed

The army, the mails Tariffs on imports

Half of all government revenue Northern business: high tariffs for

“improvements” Southern plantation owners were

opposed The great political issue of the 19th

Century

After the Civil War First federal income tax Homestead Act in 1862 The great land giveaway

1850: 63% of all land federal 1912: half that

The thin line between economic development and corruption

Political Results of the Compromise of 1877

North Republican, South Democratic “politics of dead center”

Party politics a national obsession Political and social conflict about rich

and poor, not North and South

Politics after 1877 Party differences mostly rhetorical Huge corruption in government at all

levels Hardly any social welfare spending Intense political life, spoils system

Plunkett, doc. 19-5 Urban social services through

parties Ward heelers and the poor

Labor Unions arise after Civil War 1865-1900: wages of skilled

workers double, unskilled decline Craft and industrial unionism National Labor Union

Founded in 1866 Based on local craft unions Votes to admit women and blacks,

but In practice, usually doesn’t Attempt to establish labor party Collapses in Depression of 1870s

The Knights of Labor Industrial unionism: skilled and

unskilled, men and women, white and black

Exclusion of Chinese: Doc. 18-1 “Producerism”: cooperatives as

alternative to capitalism, alliance with farmers

Manufacturers can join as fellow producers

Labor politics

Terence Powderly, mayor of Scranton and leader of Knights of Labor

Henry George and the New York Labor Party

The Great Upheaval of 1886 1885: Knights of Labor defeat Jay

Gould in rail strike K of L grows like wildfire 8 hour day and Mayday Haymarket and Albert Parsons Powderly comes out against

strikes; K of L collapses

The Haymarket Affair

The monument

The American Federation of Labor

Samuel Gompers National craft unionism “Pure and Simple”

Skilled workers, high dues Unskilled, immigrants, blacks and

women excluded No more involvement with politics

The West during the Gilded Age The reader, Chapter 17

Doc. 17-2, the pioneer experience 17-3: Mexican Americans in

Southwest 17-4: The Indian experience from

the Indian viewpoint 17-5: The reservations, what the

US government had in mind for Native Americans

17-1: the Chinese in California

The Ideology of the Gilded Age Economic individualism, free

market, Adam Smith No land redistribution in South

Protestant Work Ethic and the Puritans

Democrats and Republicans Social Darwinism

Darwin, Spencer and Sumner Carnegie and Gould

Discussion Exercise onGilded Age Ideology

Ungraded practice exercise Based on documents in reader

Chapter 18, from Gould, Sumner, Lloyd, Carnegie and George, 18-1 through 18-5

See Discussion Questions posting

Next Class

The Crisis of the 1890s: Populism, Depression; War and Jim Crow

Discussion Exercise on Spanish-American War Thursday

Readings: Foner, Chapter 17 Johnson, Chapters 19 and 20;

docs. 21-5 and 21-6