Fourth Party System [1890s–1932] II Flashcards
Review - Timeline: Industrialization and the Rise of Big Business, 1870-1900
1870: John D. Rockefeller founds ‘Standard Oil’. 1873: Andrew Carnegie founds ‘Carnegie Steel’; ‘Panic of 1873’ triggers extended depression. 1876: Alexander Graham Bell patents the telephone. 1877: ‘Great Railroad Strike’ lasts forty-five days. 1879: Thomas Edison invents the light bulb. 1886: Labor rally at Haymarket Square erupts in violence; ‘American Federation of Labor’ is founded. 1892: ‘Homestead Steel Strike’.
Timeline: The Growing Pains of Urbanization, 1870-1900
1876: Professional baseball begins with the founding of the National League. 1885: Chicago builds first ten-story skyscraper. 1887: Frank Sprague invents electric trolley. 1889: Jane Addams opens ‘Hull House’ in Chicago. 1890: Jacob Riis publishes ‘How the Other Half Lives’; ‘Carnegie Hall’ opens in New York. 1893: ‘City Beautiful’ movement begins. 1895: Coney Island amusement parks open.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age
Voter participation was at an all-time high, and elections often had razor-thin margins, but neither party really seemed to do anything. Congress debated little more than tariffs and currency, despite decades of unrelenting social and economic change in the nation. The presidency was virtually powerless, the names of Gilded Age presidents nearly unknown. The presidents themselves weren’t implicated in any major scandals, but many of the people around them were. The problem was that government jobs were generally granted to people as a reward for their political favors.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age - Rutherford B. Hayes (R)
Selected in what has come to be called the ‘corrupt bargain’ to end Reconstruction. (1877-1881)
Rutherford B. Hayes (1822-1893), the 19th president of the United States, won a controversial and fiercely disputed election against Samuel Tilden. He withdrew troops from the Reconstruction states in order to restore local control and good will, a decision that many perceived as a betrayal of African Americans in the South. He served a single term, as he had promised in his inaugural address.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age - James Garfield (R)
Shot dead after just four months. (1881)
James Garfield (1831-81) was sworn in as the 20th U.S. president in March 1881 and died in September of that same year from an assassin’s bullet, making his tenure in office the second-shortest in U.S. presidential history, after William Henry Harrison (1773-1841). Born in an Ohio log cabin, Garfield was a self-made man who became a school president in his mid-20s. During the U.S. Civil War (1861-65), he fought for the Union and rose to the rank of major general. Garfield, a Republican, went on to represent his home state in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he served from 1863 to 1881. In 1880, a divided Republican Party chose Garfield as its dark horse presidential nominee. After winning the general election, his brief time in office was marked by political wrangling. In July 1881, Garfield was shot by a disgruntled constituent and died less than three months later.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age - Chester Arthur (R)
Whose party refused to nominate him after he actually accomplished something, passing the ‘Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act’. (1881-1885)
Chester Arthur (1829-1886), the 21st U.S. president, took office after the death of President James Garfield (1831-1881). As president from 1881 to 1885, Arthur advocated for civil service reform. A Vermont native, he became active in Republican politics in the 1850s as a New York City lawyer. In 1871, an era of political machines and patronage, Arthur was named to the powerful position of customs collector for the Port of New York. He later was removed from the job by President Rutherford Hayes (1822-1893) in an attempt to reform the spoils system. Elected to the vice presidency in 1880, Arthur became president after Garfield died following an assassination attempt by a disgruntled job seeker. While in office, Arthur rose above partisanship and in 1883 signed the Pendleton Act, which required government jobs to be distributed based on merit. Suffering from poor health, he did not run for reelection in 1884.
Political Corruption in Postbellum America (A)
In the years following the Civil War, American politics were disjointed, corrupt, and, at the federal level, largely ineffective in terms of addressing the challenges that Americans faced. Local and regional politics, and the bosses who ran the political machines, dominated through systematic graft and bribery. Americans around the country recognized that solutions to the mounting problems they faced would not come from Washington, DC, but from their local political leaders. Thus, the cycle of federal ineffectiveness and machine politics continued through the remainder of the century relatively unabated.
Political Corruption in Postbellum America (B)
Meanwhile, in the Compromise of 1877, an electoral commission declared Rutherford B. Hayes the winner of the contested presidential election in exchange for the withdrawal of federal troops from South Carolina, Louisiana, and Florida. As a result, Southern Democrats were able to reestablish control over their home governments, which would have a tremendous impact on the direction of southern politics and society in the decades to come.
Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act
Pendleton Civil Service Act, (Jan. 16, 1883), landmark U.S. legislation establishing the tradition and mechanism of permanent federal employment based on merit rather than on political party affiliation (the spoils system). It also prevents most civil service employees from being fired based on their political views. In 2013, the ‘Pendleton Act’ applied to more than 90% of federal workers. It officially brought patronage and the spoils system to an end in the federal government, but it did not end the corruption, as political parties increasingly turned to industrial leaders who purchased influence and assured that legislation would continue to favor big business. Frustrated, farmers organized the People’s Party to advance their own agenda, but it was quickly engulfed by the Democrats.
Spoils System
In politics and government, a spoils system (also known as a patronage system) is a practice in which a political party, after winning an election, gives government civil service jobs to its supporters, friends, and relatives as a reward for working toward victory, and as an incentive to keep working for the party—as opposed to a merit system, where offices are awarded on the basis of some measure of merit, independent of political activity. The term was used particularly in politics of the United States, where the federal government operated on a spoils system until the Pendleton Act was passed in 1883 due to a civil service reform movement. Thereafter the spoils system was largely replaced by a nonpartisan merit at the federal level of the United States. Similar spoils systems are common in other nations that traditionally have been based on tribal organization or other kinship groups and localism in general.
The People’s Party
The Populists were an agrarian-based political movement aimed at improving conditions for the country’s farmers and agrarian workers. The Populist movement was preceded by the Farmer’s Alliance and the Grange. The People’s Party was a political party founded in 1891 by leaders of the Populist movement. It fielded a candidate in the US presidential election of 1892 and garnered 8.5% of the popular vote, which was a substantial amount of support for a third party. The Populists allied with the labor movement and were folded into the Democratic Party in 1896, though a small remnant of the People’s Party continued to exist until it was formally disbanded in 1908.
Political Machines
The ‘Pendleton Act’ didn’t apply to state and city politics. In states and large cities, politics were frequently controlled by political machines. Used for the maintenance of power by a single boss or an elite group, these networks essentially bought votes to gain and hold office, and then used the positions of power to obtain high-paying contracts and favorable legislation. Tammany Hall, a Democrat party machine that ruled New York City for 70 years, is a notable example of this type of organization. Ruled at its peak by Boss Tweed, it gained support among new immigrants, exchanging votes for benefits, sometimes as blatant as cash payments. It defrauded the taxpayers out of the modern equivalent of billions of dollars and its members often achieved and expanded their power through criminal means.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age - Grover Cleveland (D)
Who may be most famously remembered as the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms. (1885–1889 and 1893–1897)
Grover Cleveland (1837-1908), who served as the 22nd and 24th U.S. president, was known as a political reformer. He is the only president to date who served two nonconsecutive terms, and also the only Democratic president to win election during the period of Republican domination of the White House that stretched from Abraham Lincoln’s (1809-65) election in 1860 to the end of William Howard Taft’s (1857-1930) term in 1913. Cleveland worked as a lawyer and then served as mayor of Buffalo, New York, and governor of New York state before assuming the presidency in 1885. His record in the Oval Office was mixed. Not regarded as an original thinker, Cleveland considered himself a watchdog over Congress rather than an initiator. In his second term, he angered many of his original supporters and seemed overwhelmed by the Panic of 1893 and the depression that followed. He declined to run for a third term.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age - Benjamin Harrison (R)
Whose most memorable legacy might be that he was the grandson of President William Henry Harrison and the ‘Sherman Antitrust Act’. (1889 to 1893)
Benjamin Harrison followed the distinguished example of his grandfather William Henry Harrison all the way to the White House, winning election as the nation’s 23rd president in 1888. While his support for protective tariffs led to rising prices for consumers and arguably paved the way for the nation’s future economic woes, his bold pursuit of America’s foreign policy goals (including his proposal to annex the Hawaiian Islands) displayed his expanded vision of the nation’s role in world affairs. In 1890, Harrison signed into law the Sherman Antitrust Act, the first piece of legislation designed to prohibit industrial combinations, or trusts. Before the end of his first term, support for Harrison was waning even within the Republican Party. In 1892, he lost his bid for reelection to Grover Cleveland by a wide margin; he remained active in public life as a lawyer and public speaker until his death in 1901.
‘Forgotten’ Presidents of the Gilded Age - William McKinley (R)
Known for starting the ‘Spanish-American War’ and then being assassinated by an anarchist. (1897-1901)
William McKinley served in the U.S. Congress and as governor of Ohio before running for the presidency in 1896. As a longtime champion of protective tariffs, the Republican McKinley ran on a platform of promoting American prosperity and won a landslide victory over Democrat William Jennings Bryan to become the 25th president of the United States. In 1898, McKinley led the nation into war with Spain over the issue of Cuban independence; the brief and decisive conflict ended with the U.S. in possession of Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam. In general, McKinley’s bold foreign policy opened the doors for the United States to play an increasingly active role in world affairs. Reelected in 1900, McKinley was assassinated by a deranged anarchist in Buffalo, New York, in September 1901.
Evaluate what Social Darwinism had to do with business and labor.
Many Americans during the Second Industrial Revolution felt that the government had no right to interfere with business, aka laissez-faire capitalism. Many also accepted the idea of Social Darwinism, believing that ‘survival of the fittest’ applied not only to nature, but also to society. Therefore, the struggle between labor and management was only natural, and if it was allowed to play out, then the economy and the people would evolve into something stronger - at least in theory. As a result, there was almost no legal protection for workers, and with record immigration, they had no leverage over management.
Discern the differences between unions such as AFL and IWW - ‘Knights of Labor’ and the ‘American Federation of Labor’.
American workers turned in large numbers to labor unions to try to increase their bargaining power. The ‘Knights of Labor’ (est. 1869) sought equal work for equal pay, including women and blacks, and an 8-hour workday. They were later replaced by the ‘American Federation of Labor’ (est. 1886; AFL), led by Samuel Gompers, which moderately worked to improve conditions for skilled workers within the existing economic structure. They approved racially segregated local unions and varied in the openness to women.
Discern the differences between unions such as AFL and IWW - ‘Industrial Workers of the World’.
American workers turned in large numbers to labor unions to try to increase their bargaining power. The ‘Industrial Workers of the World’ (est. 1905; IWW), or ‘Wobblies’, led by Eugene Debs, was the most militant of the early labor unions and openly called for class warfare and aggression, including sabotage, and sought a day when workers would seize machines and factories themselves. Debs ran as a presidential candidate for the ‘Socialist Party’ several times.
Recall the unrest and violence of some of the strikes during the Second Industrial Revolution - Summary.
Summary: There were thousands of strikes and other union actions in this era, which were resisted fiercely by business owners and managers. After the Haymarket demonstration in Chicago (1886), public opinion turned against the unions, believing they had become too radical. And after the Pullman Strike (1894), also in Chicago, the federal government expanded its role in labor disputes.
Recall the unrest and violence of some of the strikes during the Second Industrial Revolution - ‘Great Railroad Strike of 1877’.
In the ‘Great Railroad Strike of 1877’, the nation was still feeling the effects of the Panic of 1873, with unemployment as high as 14%. When railroad employees in West Virginia had their pay cut twice in a matter of months, they went on strike, but railroad executives were unable or unwilling to discuss their demands. The strike spread to cities across the nation, leading to riots, arson, destruction of railroad property and even gun battles with state and federal troops. Before it was all over, more than 100 men were dead, and more than $100 million worth of property had been damaged. But, there were no increases in pay and the War Department created the National Guard to handle such problems in the future.
Recall the unrest and violence of some of the strikes during the Second Industrial Revolution - ‘Haymarket Demonstration’.
In 1886, the Haymarket Demonstration turned public opinion against the unions, who felt that they were becoming too radical and threatening law and order. Union membership fell dramatically in the years that followed. It was a nationwide strike that involved 340,000 workers from 12,000 companies, all of whom were pushing for a standard 8-hour workday.
Social and Labor Unrest in the 1890s
As the economy worsened, more Americans suffered; as the federal government continued to offer few solutions, the Populist movement began to grow. Populist groups approached the 1896 election anticipating that the mass of struggling Americans would support their movement for change. When Democrats chose William Jennings Bryan for their candidate, however, they chose a politician who largely fit the mold of the Populist platform—from his birthplace of Nebraska to his advocacy of the silver standard that most farmers desired. Throwing their support behind Bryan as well, Populists hoped to see a candidate in the White House who would embody the Populist goals, if not the party name. When Bryan lost to Republican William McKinley, the Populist Party lost much of its momentum. As the country climbed out of the depression, the interest in a third party faded away, although the reformist movement remained intact.
Homestead Steel Strike
The Homestead strike, also known as the Homestead steel strike or Homestead massacre, was an industrial lockout and strike which began on July 1, 1892, culminating in a battle between strikers and private security agents on July 6, 1892. The dispute occurred at the Homestead Steel Works in the Pittsburgh area town of Homestead, Pennsylvania, between the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers (the AA) and the Carnegie Steel Company. The battle was a pivotal event in U.S. labor history because it underscored how difficult it was for any union to prevail against the combined power of the corporation and the government, despite inspiring many workers.
Recall the unrest and violence of some of the strikes during the Second Industrial Revolution - ‘Pullman Strike’.
In 1894, the ‘Pullman Strike’ is notable because it started the president that the government could intervene in labor disputes in the future and the union movement was subdued even further. The Pullman Company, which made luxury railroad sleeper cars and controlled its employees in a ‘company town’, cut their wages by 40%. The workers went on strike and Eugene Debs encouraged railroad workers around the country to not run trains with Pullman cars attached. The government stepped in because sidelined trains pulled post office cars.
