Transcript No Slide Title

The wealthy lived extravagant lifestyles and
considered themselves elitists.
 The common people resented their snobbish attitudes
and wealth. There was a de facto caste system in the U.S.
1861---------3 millionaires----------1900--------3,800
1900, 90% of wealth, controlled by 10% of population.
The Emergence of
Political Machines
Political Machine
• Organized group that
controls a city’s political
party
• Give services to voters,
businesses for political,
financial support
• After Civil War, machines
gain control of major cities
• Machine organization:
precinct captains, ward
bosses, city boss
The Role of the Political Boss
•May serve as mayor, he:
•controls city jobs, business licenses
•influences courts, municipal agencies
•arranges building projects, community
services
•Bosses paid by businesses, get voters’ loyalty,
extend influence
Immigrants and the Machine
•Many captains, bosses 1st or 2nd generation Americans
•Machines help immigrants with naturalization, jobs, housing
Election Fraud and Graft
•Machines use electoral fraud to win elections
•Graft—illegal use of political influence for personal gain
•Machines take kickbacks, bribes to allow legal, illegal activities
•Corrupt political leader put New
York City in debt
Political
boss
•1851 elected to city council
•1852 served in Congress
•Kept Democratic Party in power
in NYC called Tammany Hall
•Formed the Tweed Ring
•Bought votes, encouraged
corruption, controlled NYC politics
Received
large fees
for interests
(*kickbacks) from the
Erie Railroad
Tweed
Ring milked
the city with false
leases, padded bills,
false vouchers,
unnecessary repairs
and over-priced
goods
*Return of a portion of the
money received in a sale or
contract often illegal and
corrupt in return for special
favors.
Exposed
for his
corruption by
cartoonist and
editor, Thomas Nast
Tweed Ring fell
and 1873 Tweed
convicted of
embezzlement

Later
Tweed was
arrested on a civil
charge and jailed in
NYC, later died there
Credit Mobilier
•Phony construction company owned
by stockholders of Union Pacific
Railroad.
•Hired Credit Mobilier to build the
transcontinental railroad
•Charged the U.S. government nearly twice the
actual cost of the project.
•Bribed Congress to stop the investigation.
•Largest scandal in U.S. history, and led to
greater public awareness of government
corruption.
Whiskey Ring
•A group of President Grant’s officials
imported whiskey
•Used their offices to avoid paying taxes
•Cheated US treasury of millions.
Salary Grab
•Congress gave itself a raise, $5,000 to $7,500 annually.
•Congressmen received a retroactive check for $5,000,
plus their raise……
•Became a political issue….Later repealed.
Election of 1872
• Liberal Republicans and Democrats both
nominate Horace Greeley for president to
oppose Grant.
• Two people who were qualified in their own
fields, but unqualified to be politicians
• Republicans realize they have to get things
in order.
– Amnesty act for most Confederate leaders
– Reduction of high Civil War tariffs
– Mild civil-service reform
Economic problems under Grant
• Panic of 1873
– Overreaching in railroads, mining, factories,
grain production– more than markets can bear
– Bankers had made too many loans, and they
couldn’t be paid off when the profits don’t
come for companies
• Inflation or Deflation?
– Debtors want more money- prices rise, debts
easier to pay, currency devalued—inflation
– Creditors want deflation so their debts aren’t be
paid off in depreciated currency
Economic problems under Grant
• Silver vs. Gold
– Silver used as another try to inflate currency
values
• Greenbacks
– Congress reduces the amount of paper money
in circulation, and combined with using only
gold in the treasury, CONTRACTION occurs
• Deflation occurs and the money per person drops 5
cents between 1870 and 1880.
• Restores the government’s credit, and
brings the greenbacks up to face value by
1879
1876 Election
•Tilden did not
receive enough
electoral votes.
*
•Special
Commission
gives votes to
Hayes.
•Hayes wins the
election
*Disputed
Electoral votes
164
369 total electoral votes, need 185 to win.
•Democrats
refuse to
recognize Hayes
as President
Agreement between
Democrats and
Republicans
•Hayes pulls the troops
out of the South.
•Southerners take over
their state governments
called “REDEEMERS”
•Successes Freedmen
would be lost because
Southerners would take
over their state
governments.
•Jim Crow laws kept
Blacks from voting and
becoming equal
citizens.
social reality
After Reconstruction, 1865 to 1876, there
were several ways that Southern states
kept Blacks from voting and segregated,
or separating people by the color of their
skin in public facilities.
Jim Crow laws, laws at the local and state
level which segregated whites from blacks
and kept African Americans as 2nd class
citizens and from voting.
poll taxes
literacy tests
grandfather clause
social reality
The systematic practice of
discriminating against and
segregating Black people,
especially as practiced in the
American South from the end
of Reconstruction to the mid20th century
Derogatory name for a Black
person, ultimately from the
title of a 19th-century minstrel
song.
Goal: Take away political
and constitutional rights
guaranteed by Constitution:
Voting and equality of all
citizens under the law.
JC laws
Jim Crow Laws: segregated
Whites and Blacks in public
facilities became the law after
Reconstruction:
schools, parks,
transportation,
restaurants,
etc….
•kept Blacks, minorities
and poor whites from
voting and as 2nd class
citizen status
•Used at the
local, state
levels and
eventually the
national to
separate the
races in
Poll Taxes: Before you could vote, you had
to pay taxes to vote. Most poor Blacks
could not pay the tax so they didn’t vote.
Literacy Test: You had to prove you could
read and write before you could vote….
Once again, most poor Blacks were not
literate.
Grandfather clause: If your grandfather
voted in the 1860 election than you could
vote…..Most Blacks did not vote in 1860, so
you couldn’t vote….
Social equality vs. legal equality
Which way would the scale tip?
social reality
Supreme Court decision which
legalized segregation
throughout the nation.
•“Separate but Equal” as long as
public facilities were equal
•Problem: Black facilities would
never be equal to White facilities
•Our nation would be segregated
until the 1960’s.
Hayes Presidency
• Railroad strikes in 1877
– Hayes calls in federal troops to stop the strikes, and the
strikers gain working-class support
• Labor movement weak because of racial and ethnic
divisions among workers
• Example of California
– By 1880, 9% of California’s population was Chinese
– The Irish resented having to compete with the cheap
labor the Chinese provided (Kearneyites)
– Chinese Exclusion Act passed by Congress in 1882lasted until 1943
– U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark (1898)- Citizenship guaranteed
to all persons born in the United States
• Jus soli vs. jus sanguinis (right of the soil vs. right of blood-tie)
1880 Presidential Election
President
Rutherford Hayes
Elected in 1877
 Reformed the civil service,
appointing qualified political
independents instead of
giving positions to
supporters.
 No Congressional support or
from the Republican Party.
 Hayes did not seek a second
term.

President James A.
Garfield

1880 election, Republicans
were split into 3 factions.
 Stalwarts defended the spoils
system—Senator Roscoe
Conkling
 Half-Breeds reform but still
supported it– Senator James
Blaine
 Independents opposed the
spoils system.
Garfield wanted reforms.
His running-mate was
Chester Arthur, a Stalwart.
 July 2, 1881 Garfield was
assassinated by a Stalwart
who wanted Arthur as
president.

 Under the Spoils System (patronage), candidates for political
office would offer potential jobs in exchange for votes.
– gave supporters access to money and political favors.
 During the Gilded Age, the Republicans and Democrats had
roughly the same number of supporters.
– To keep party members loyal, candidates rewarded supporters and
tried to avoid controversial issues.
The Republicans
appealed to the industrialists,
bankers, and eastern farmers.


They favored the gold standard
(sound money) and high
tariffs
Blue laws, regulations that
prohibited certain activities
people considered immoral.

The Democrats
attracted the less privileged
groups.
such as northern urban
immigrants, laborers,
southern planters, and
western farmers.
Supported soft money and
silver coinage.
•Assassinated by an
upset Spoilsman.
•Led to VP Chester
Arthur becoming
president
•Supported a
change to the
corrupt spoils
system.
•Signed into the law the Pendleton Act also called the Civil
Service Act.
•Required candidates applying for government positions to a test
to determine their qualifications.
1881: Garfield Assassinated!
Charles Guiteau:
I Am a Stalwart, Arthur is now
President of the United States!
Pendleton Act (1883)
 Civil Service Act.
 The “Magna Carta” of
civil service reform.
 1883  14,000 out of
117,000 federal govt.
jobs became civil
service exam positions.
1900  100,000 out of
200,000 civil service
federal govt. jobs.
Election of 1884
• James G. Blaine (R) vs. Grover Cleveland (D)
• Mugwumps- Reform Republicans that voted
Democrat in the 1884 election
• Scandal for both candidates turns the campaign to
mud-slinging
• Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion kills Blaine’s
campaign in New York
• Cleveland wins the election
An economic belief supported by the U.S. that
opposes the government regulating business.
“Though the people support the government, the
government should not support the people”
- Grover Cleveland
In the
late 1800’s businesses operated without much
government regulation. This is known as laissez-faire
economics.
Laissez-faire
means ‘allow to be’ in French or the
government stays out of you business.
Laissez
faire supports our economic system of
capitalism
Laissez Faire Federal Govt.
 From 1870-1900  Govt. did very
little domestically.
 Main duties of the federal govt.:
 Deliver the mail.
 Maintain a national military.
 Collect taxes & tariffs.
 Conduct a foreign policy.
 Exception  administer the annual
Civil War veterans’ pension.
Economic system characterized
by private property ownership
Individuals and companies compete for their
own economic gain (Profit)
Capitalists determine the prices of goods and
services.
Production and distribution are privately or
corporately owned.
Reinvestment of profits
Supports laissez faire
Economic system based on
cooperation rather than competition
Believes in
government ownership of
business and capital
Government controls production and
distribution of goods.
Opposite of
laissez faire and
capitalism
The Issue of the Tariff
• By 1881, the Treasury was running an
annual surplus of $145 million due to high
tariffs
• To reduce the tariff, you can spend it on
pensions and pork projects or lower the
tariff
• The tariff becomes THE issue in the
Election of 1888
The Billion Dollar Congress
• New Speaker of the House, Thomas B. Reed of
Maine
• Reed was an imposing figure who bent the House
to his will
• First time in U.S. History that Congress would
appropriate over 1 billion dollars
• Pensions for Civil War Soldiers and buying more
silver increased spending
• To increase revenue, the McKinley Tariff is
passed in 1890 to increase the level to 48.4%, the
highest peacetime level ever
• Republicans get destroyed in 1890 midterm
elections. 235-88 for the Democrats in the House
Rise of the Populists
• Origins in the discontent of farmers
• Created in 1892, the Populists adopted their first platform
in Omaha, Nebraska
– Free and unlimited coinage of silver at 16 oz. of silver
to 1 oz. of gold
– Graduated income tax
– Government ownership of railroads, telegraph, and
telephone
– Direct election of U.S. Senators
– One-term limit on the presidency
– Initiative and referendum to give citizens more power
– Shorter workday
– Restrictions on immigration
1892 Election
Panic of 1893
 Began 10 days after Cleveland took office.
1. Several major corps. went bankrupt.
o Over 16,000 businesses disappeared.
o Triggered a stock market crash.
o Over-extended investments.
2. Bank failures followed causing a contraction
of credit [nearly 500 banks closed].
3. By 1895, unemployment reached 3 million.
 Americans cried out for relief, but the Govt.
continued its laissez faire policies!!
How bad does it get?
• In 1894, the gold reserve sinks to $41
million
• The government borrows $65 million in
gold from J.P. Morgan and other Wall
Street bankers
– Get a $7 million commission for their loan
Backlash against Cleveland and
the Democrats
• Deal with Morgan looks bad to much of the
countries
• Wilson-Gorman Tariff in 1894 lowers the
tariff rate only slightly
– Also contained a 2 percent tax on incomes
above $4,000
• Struck down by the Supreme Court in 1895
• Republicans regain a huge majority, 244105, in the House