Chapter 8
Rising Protests
(1865 - 1900)
I. Organizing Labor
A. Growth of Unions
New Work Place
- Advantages
- Workers united becoming stronger
- Machines made some work easier, faster
- Increased production
- Workers closer together could discuss common problems
- Court attitudes gradually began to favor unions
- Commonwealth v. Hunt
- Middle class created once skill and educational level became important
- Differences from old work place
- Government favored big business
- Lose personal contact with employees - individual became unimportant
- Lack of supervision - boss far removed from workers
- Technological Unemployment
- Specialized work
- No safety valve after 1890
- Disadvantages
- Low Wages - $9/week Ave. - $435/year - 1900
- Long Hours - 60-80 hrs./week
- Women/Children 12-14hrs./day textile workers ($5-6/week)
- 12% unemployment during depressions
- Most workers were able to buy only necessities
- Monotony
- Work Conditions declined
- machines dangerous
- 1880 - 1900 - injuries/5 deaths/day
- Company Town
- Today - fringe benefits are key issue, not then
- Technological unemployment
- skilled workers replaced by machines
- unskilled workers pay lowered
- Those without education left behind
- 1st unions - late 1700s - were mostly local
- lack of unity
- not until after the Civil War did they gain in strength
- Reasons for the rise of unions
- the need to bargain effectively with employers
- the growth of industry - explosion of labor force
- immigrants
- farmers
- women
- children
- Business Cycle - pattern of boom and bust
- put the parts of the business cycle on the board
- Expansion - Prosperity
- Recession
- milder economic downturns
- Depression
- a time of high unemployment
- low consumer spending
- many business failures
- Recovery
- GNP - define / averaged 4% increase/year throughout the Gilded
Age
- raising the Standard of Living - increased 2% a year
- Depression regularity - every 20 years - nobody understood the causes
therefore laissez-faire
- Panic of 1873 - worst Depression yet
- (3 million unemployed/ Farmer debtors going out-of-business)
- 450 RRs went bankrupt
- Debtors wanted an easy-money policy
- Greenbacks kept, but not increased = Depression eased
- Bland Allison Act - 1878 - gold standard = stable currency -
Republicans
- Panic of 1893
- 318 RRs went bankrupt
- Opposed labor unions
- today government is expected to take action to lessen the swings of the
cycle
- pumping up a sluggish economy
- slowing an overheated economy
Reaction - the formation of Unions
- Absenteeism - many took time off (especially Mondays) because of such long
hours and harsh working conditions
- Sabotage - some destroyed machines out of frustration
- Group Resistance - violence, strikes, organization
- Unionization/Organization (before Civil War, unions not popular)
- Types
- Industrial - skilled and unskilled all in same industry
- Craft - skilled only
- Wants
- Better conditions
- Right to organize/strike (1842 - Commonwealth vs. Hunt)
- "Collective bargaining"
B. The National Labor Union
- Molly Maguires - early 1870s
- coal miners used violence to obtain goals
- Pinkerton agency infiltrated and destroyed
- National Labor Union - 1866 - William Sylvis
- First with a "national scope"
- First to unite skilled and unskilled workers
- 650,000 members by the 1870's
- Tactics
- Strike - business panic of 1873 made things difficult
- believed they should avoid strikes
- form cooperatives instead
- businesses owned by the workers themselves
- Sabotage
- Work slowdowns
- Boycott
- Use political means to achieve ends
- pushed for Chinese Exclusion Act
- sought 8 hour work day
- formed independent party - 1872
- Bad political choices and 70's depressions killed it!
- Involved in politics - destroyed union
C. The Knights of Labor
- Knights of Labor - 1869
- Uriah Stephens
- Membership - secret organization
- skilled
- unskilled - contributed to downfall when skilled workers would not
strike in support
- Tactics
- involved in politics
- sought an end to child labor
- public ownership of RR and telegraphs
- 8 hour work days
- coops
- Lost several strikes due to lack of experience and financial
preparation
- Terence Powderly (1879) took over
- ended secrecy
- 1886 - peak - 700,000 - majority did not join - declined
D. The Haymarket Riot - 1886
- Chicago strikers - 8 hr. day - strike against McCormick Harvester Co.
- Anarchists - people who oppose all forms of government
- supported the strikers
- hoped to gain union support
- Treated brutally by police - 1 killed
- Protesters then march against police brutality
- 200 police showed up
- Bomb thrown at police
- killed 7 police wounded 67 bystanders - police opened fire - 4 killed
many injured
- 8 Radicals found guilty of murder (6 not at Haymarket)
- 4 hanged, 3 life-pardoned, 1 suicide
- Judge ruled that those who incited the riot were as guilty as those
who committed it
- Public convinced Knights = violence
- Linked Knights with Anarchy
- Began a rapid decline of Knights membership
E. The American Federation of Labor
- American Federation of Labor - 1886
- Samuel Gompers (leader 1886-1924)
- Separate Unions by skills - "Craft Unions"
- Skilled workers only
- Collective Bargaining
- representatives from employees and employer meet to negotiate
- focus only on
- wages
- hours
- working conditions
- sought closed shop
- the employer would agree to hire only union workers
- Union dues to aid strikes
- Avoided politics
- Prejudice - women, recent immigrants, blacks
- Only small advances during Gilded Age yet by 1902 - 1.75 million
- Still around (AFL-CIO)
II. Striking Against Big Business
A. Opposition to Unions
- During the Gilded Age, only about 2% of workers joined unions!
- Went against American traditions
- Business arguments
- Americans didn't have the right to strike
- violated the principal of free enterprise
- wages should be determined by supply and demand
- The public sided with big business
- Too violent (Molly Maguires, Homestead Strike, Pullman Strike)
- Too Radical - socialists, communists, anarchists
- Government sided with Big Business used injunctions and troops - (14th
Amendment)
- Businesses used
- "blacklists"
- "lockouts"
- "strike-breakers"
- Pinkerton men
- "yellow dog contracts"
Unions Today
- 1990 - 18% (36% in 1945; 2% during Gilded Age)
- $405 per week - Union; $303 non-Union
B. The Railroad Strike of 1877 - 7/77
- Panic of 1873
- caused 10% wage cut
- Blacklists - lists of people suspected of disloyalty
- often fired
- other companies would not hire them because they were considered
troublemakers
- Baltimore and Ohio RR (B&O) workers started the strike - 7/77
- strike spread - result - 2/3 of nation's RRs shut down
- violence, bloodshed
- destruction of RR - hurt cause public sided with companies
- Hayes used federal troops to settle dispute
C. The Homestead Strike - 1892
- Carnegie Steel Co. - Homestead. Penn.
- Henry Clay Frick - attempted to break the Union
- cut wages of some skilled workers
- all workers went on strike
- Frick hired 300 Pinkerton agents to protect the plant
- confrontation between agents and strikers
- 9 strikers and 7 guards killed
- workers took over the plant
- 8,000 state troops retook the plant
- reopened to nonunion workers only
- violence continued and the troops remained for 4 months
- Strike failed and union took a pay cut
- only 20% rehired
- no Union contract for next 45 years
- AFL hurt, but did survive
D. The Pullman Strike - 1894
- George Pullman built a model town for his workers
- modern housing
- a new factory
- a library
- enclosed shopping
- recreational facilities
- workers were very well treated and very happy
- Panic of 1893
- Pullman was forced to lay off nearly half of 6,000 workers
- The rest received pay cuts - no reduction in rents
- In mid-1894 rehired 2,000 workers, but pay cuts continued
- Eugene V. Debs - American Railway Union - 1893
- became national figure - converted to socialism while in prison
- Socialist presidential candidate 5 times
- union allowed both skilled and unskilled workers
- Pullman fired union reps - workers went on strike - May 1894
- Pullman laid off all workers and shut down the plant
- RR workers across America were asked to support
- workers refusing to handle Pullman cars were fired
- most of America's trains were shut down
- RR owners hired new workers and attached mail cars to each Pullman car
- stopping the mail = crime
- troops sent to run the train - broke strike
- 1st use of injunction on strike (based on Sherman Anti-trust Act) - Pres.
Cleveland
- interference with interstate commerce
- Debs jailed when he refused to stop the strike
- hurt labors image - government seen as siding with owners vs. labor not
neutral
- Life for skilled workers and unskilled workers both declined in the
beginning of the industrial revolution.
- Later skilled workers began to make gains and the industrial revolution
provided new wonders for those with the time and the money to enjoy them.
III. Organizing Farmers
A. Problems Facing the Farmers
- Mary Elizabeth Lease
- Kansas lawyer
- fiery personality and dramatic speaker
- helped to found the Populist Party
- Basic Problem - Incomes were falling and Costs were rising
- 1. Bad weather - always a problem
- soil erosion
- drought, flood
- isolation and loneliness
- but by late 1800s, many more!
- 2. Crop prices dropped sharply
- Overproduction
- increased mechanization and technology
- "scientific farming"
- irrigation
- crop rotation
- pesticides
- hybrid crops, etc.
- supply and demand
- (as West opened, acreage doubled to 900m!)
- work easier - less time (3 hrs. to 4 minutes)
- increased production 3x led to 3x exports
- production - small farms increased
- 1870 - $1.00/bushel
- 1890 - $ .63/bushel
- 1894 - $ .49/bushel (deflation)
- Competition increased - including overseas - had to grow 2x to break
even
- labor - hired workers
- flight to cities
- Worldwide Depression - work hard - produce more - prices fall - earn
less (by 1880s, an Agricultural Depression)
- 3. Cost of farm machinery
- High tariffs on foreign made machines
- Supplies - cost for equipment high (tariffs and monopolies)
- 4. RR costs were high
- RR charged more for long haul out west than short haul in the East
- monopoly
- 5. Distribution Problem - people starving in the world
- Should govt. get involved?
- Mary Elizabeth Pease - proposed feeding the poor
- Jerry Simpson - proposed increasing foreign markets
- 6. Debt
- credit - long and short term
- land not legal security only an asset - 43% mortgaged
- bank could seize land if debts not paid
- bad risk = high interest rate - 25%
- money supply shortage - tight money
- Taxes - property tax, tariff
- small farms went broke
- Self sufficient farmers who did not suffer debt problems survived
- larger farms purchased bankrupt farms at low prices
- tenant farming - 1880's - 1900
- commercial farming - specialization - helped farmers to become
self-sufficient
- wheat - Great Plains
- cotton - South
- corn and hogs - Midwest
- 7. Inadequate currency
- Deflation ($25 per capita)
- Double amount of corn to buy a dollar!
- Is money:
- medium of coin?
- medium of exchange? (what it will buy)
- Farmers wanted "cheap money"
- (prices would rise; debts would be "reduced")
- 8. pollution
- 9. End of isolation - phones and autos
- % population = farmers declined
- farmers went from basis of society to uneducated yokels (Aggie Jokes)
- number of farmers increased as Great Plains were opened
- 1860 - 25 million (1860 - 80%; today - 2%)
- 1890 - 41 million
- average farm = 150 acres
- average work week = 68 hrs. compared to industry = 56 hrs.
- The farmers had no "voice" in gov't to represent them!
B. The Grange (Patrons of Husbandry) - 1867 - Oliver H. Kelley
- First organization that focused on solving farmer problems
- the earliest effort to organize farmers
- they wanted a greater share of the wealth
- major social organization
- problem - boredom and loneliness
- solution - Grange suppers and picnics
- helped farmers keep up with rapid changes in technology and scientific
agriculture
- Panic of 1873 - drove 1000s into the Grange
- Farmers' Declaration of Independence - July 4, 1873
- 1875 - 800,000 members
- mostly in the Great Plains (weak in the South)
- organized Cooperatives - buy/sell bypassing middlemen
- middlemen - farmers got less than 1/2 of city price
- grain storage elevators
- packing houses
- insurance companies
- rr (monopolies)
- charged as much as possible
- viewed as greatest culprit
- produce cooperatives sell direct to customer
- buying coops - purchase in bulk - equipment, household goods
- building and owning their own facilities thus reducing their cost
- grain elevators
- warehouses
- insurance co.
- banks
- most failed due to
- opposition
- lack of experience - poor planning
- lack of capital
- corruption
- farmers sense of independence
- The Grange entered politics - backing candidates for state legislatures
and Congress
- Granger Laws - state laws that regulated RR and grain elevator
rates
- 1877 - Munn v. Illinois - grain elevators had prices set by the
state
- courts upheld - intrastate trade
- established the principle that state legislatures had the power to
regulate businesses of a public nature like the RR
- 1886 - Wabash v. Illinois - attempts to regulate railroads
through state laws
- defeated by Sup. Ct. - interstate trade
- only national government could regulate interstate trade
- reversed or limited Munn
- Interstate Commerce Commission - 1887
- created ICC to regulate
- pooling
- rebates
- unjust rates
- 1st attempt by national government to regulate business
- stopped "long haul" vs. "short haul"
- power to investigate complaints of excessive rates
- no power to establish rates!
- found it difficult to define reasonable rate
- RR ignored it and the ICC lacked enforcement power
- between 1887 and 1906 RR won 15 of 16 cases
- The Grange proved what farmers could accomplish if they worked together
C. Farmers' Alliances
- Put more emphasis on government action than did the Grange
- More radical (militant) and more political
- marked a transition from Grange to Populist
- sought lower taxes on farmers and higher taxes on RR
- Sought federal warehouses scattered across the country - called
subtreasuries
- farmers could store the grain there until prices rose
- government could loan money to repay debts - up to 80% of current market
value
- when crops sold government would be repayed
- Southern Alliance
- (began in Texas in 1877)
- 3 million whites
- 1 million blacks - Colored Farmers' Alliance - 1888
- backed Democrats
- insisted on segregation
- supported a national banking system empowered to issue paper money
- Northern Alliance
- 1 million farmers from Great Plains and Midwest
- backed Republicans
- insisted on integration
- Colorful leaders
- "Pitchfork" Ben Tilman
- "Sockless" Jerry Simpson
- Mary Elizabeth Lease
- The Ocala Platform - 1890 - these were radical proposals
- Direct Election of Senators
- Lowering of the Tariff
- The creation of a new banking system
- government should take an active role
- increase the amount of money in circulation
- create inflation and reduce debt
- the creation of subtreasuries
- creation of the graduated income tax
- regulation of transportation and communication networks...if this fails
take them over
- 1890 Congressional Elections
- took control of 12 state legislatures
- elected 6 governors
- sent 50 representatives to Congress
- July 4, 1892 - Omaha, Nebraska
- Representatives from the Alliances met to form a third party
D. The Populist Platform - 1892 - 1896
- 1. Democrats and Republicans ignored farmers
- "The controlling influences dominating the old political parties have
allowed the existing dreadful conditions to develop without serious effort
to restrain or prevent them."
- 2. The Populist Party (combined with other reformers)
- Parallels to rise of Christianity
- (grew out of "conspiracy" against God)
- (farmers and others felt like they were victims of conspiracy!)
- Believed "apocalypse" was at hand! Doing duty to "purify" America
- 3. Omaha Platform - (July 4, 1892) - called for sweeping reforms in
several areas
- Political
- Term limits for President and VP - one term
- Australian - secret ballot
- Direct election - Senators
- Direct primaries
- initiative - citizens write their own laws
- referendum - reject bills passed by the legislature
- recall - remove public officials from office
- Economic
- most radical - government ownership of natural monopolies (socialist)
- banks
- rr
- reclamation of all land given to RR and not used for tracks
- telegraph
- (public utilities)
- never fully adopted
- Lower the tariff
- graduated income tax vs. 2% flat tax
- 16th amendment - graduated income tax - 1913
- proposals designed to win over urban labor
- 8 hours work day
- immigration restriction
- condemnation of the use of Pinkerton agents against labor
- cheap money - raise inflation - silver 16 to 1
- most controversial demand
- inflate currency (to $50 per capita) by coining silver
- Many regarded this just short of communism!
E. The Money Issue
- Populists made cheap money the key issue of the 1896 election
- Crime of 1873 - demonetized silver leaving gold as the sole basis on US
money
- If the government keeps the money supply tight each dollar becomes
worth more
- Deflation - falling prices were the result
- Panic of 1873 - led to more calls for expanded money
- Greenback Party formed in 1876 (also had candidates in 1880, 1884)
- Most people agreed that the money supply should be on the gold
standard
- paper money should be backed by a specific amount of gold
- this would limit the amount of money
- because the economy was growing so fast this created deflation
- Bland-Allison Act - 1878 - required the government to purchase silver
and mint coins
- Sherman Silver Purchase Act - 1890
- increased the amount of silver used for coins
- William H. Harvey - economist who supported free and unlimited
coinage of silver
- claimed that all of the farmers economic problems could be solved
through this
- Cheap money causes inflation (rising prices) which benefits debtors
- printing more money increases the supply which makes the money worth
less
- Easiest way to obtain cheap money is by having the government increase
the amount of money in circulation
- Inflation helps some groups
- people who sell goods benefit - charge higher prices
- debtors benefit - the money they repay is worth less than the money
they borrow
- Panic of 1893
- Cleveland blamed the depression on a weakening of the gold standard
through the purchase of silver
- Cleveland (D) repealed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act in 1893
- Democrats forced to change due to loss of popularity
F. The Election of 1892
- Dem - Grover Cleveland (5m, 277)
- Rep - Benjamin Harrison (5m, 145)
- 1892 candidate - James B. Weaver
- won 1 million votes - 1st third party candidate to get 1 million votes
- won 4 states and 22 electoral votes
- Kansas
- Colorado
- Idaho
- Nevada
- Oregon and North Dakota voters split
- Southern farmers were unwilling to abandon the Democratic Party
- most Populists were rural Americans in the South and West who stood
outside the mainstream of American life
- forced Democrats to adopt their platform to win back votes
IV. The Rise and Fall of Populism
- Panic of 1893 (one of negative effects of industrialization was
"periodic eco. downturns")
- Effects
- 500 banks failed in the first year
- 15,000 businesses went bankrupt (1893-1897)
- 20% of all workers lost their jobs - 3 million
- Coxey's Army - 1894
- several hundred unemployed workers marched on Washington DC
- led by Jacob Coxey
- sought help for those turned unemployed by the Panic of 1893
- wanted govt to provide jobs; arrested for trespassing!
- 750,000 workers struck, some were very violent
- (including the Homestead Strike and Pullman Strike)
-
A. Cleveland and the Gold Drain
- Causes - overextension of the railroad, high tariffs, gold drain
- silver pouring into Treasury
- if silver became only standard, money would be "cheap"
- big business and bankers did not want this
- Americans and Europeans exchanging bank notes for gold
- Causes of the Depression
- bad times in Europe
- declining farm prices
- overexpansion of industry and RR
- Business closings wrecked the banking system
- Remedy - Cleveland believed it was caused by monetary uncertainty
- Cleveland blamed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act
- People began turning in silver certificates in for gold
- Drained gold supplies
- weakened people's confidence in the economy
- bankers and business leaders feared inflation
- fear created problem or made it worse
- Cleveland repealed the Silver Purchase Act and sold bonds
- 1895 - Cleveland got J.P. Morgan to buy gold to save the country
- he did, at a $7m profit for himself!
- Gov't began selling bonds
- Morgan bought at a low rate
- Cleveland hoped to urge people to use their gold to buy gov't bonds
- they did and Morgan sold high making another profit at the expense
of the people
- JP Morgan and the rich got richer
- the public did not
- Were big business and gov't in "bed together"?
B. Struggles in the Courts
- United States v. E.C. Knight - 1895
- American Sugar Refining Co. controlled 90% of sugar refining
- Supreme Court ruled that maufacturing businesses were not engaged in
interstate commerce and therefore could have monopolies
- Congress didn't have the right to regulate them only interstate
- In US v. Knight ruled that monopolies were not necessarily bad!
- Pollock v. Farmers' Loan and Trust Co. - 1894
- Wilson - Gorman Tariff included the first income tax in peacetime US
history
- the Supreme Court ruled that an income tax on the wealthy was
unconstitutional
- The Supreme Court also upheld conviction of Eugene V. Debs
- arguing "the strong arm of the national government may be put forth to
brush away all obstructions to the freedom of interstate commerce"
- Were the courts and business working together to suppress the common
people?
- By 1896, the country's mood was tense and the Populists looked to the
election to address their complaints
C. The Conventions of 1896
- Issues - "Battle of the Standards" (gold v. silver)
- Background
- 1792 - Mint Act (bimetallic system, at 15:1)
- 1834 - Changed to 16:1
- 1873 Congress dropped silver ("Crime of '73")
- Bland-Allison Act (1878) and Sherman Silver Purchase Act (1890)
- obligated gov't to buy silver for purpose of "coinage"
- (but not enough for many!)
- 1893 - Sherman Silver Purchase Act repealed
- split the Dem. Party into two factions
- "gold bugs" - silverites were viewed as dangerous radicals
- "silverites" - for the working people against the wealthy
- (the silver issue would dominate pol. for the next few yrs)
- ("free silver" would inflate currency)
- 1) American Bimetallic League (Leading spokesman was WJB)
- 2) William Harvey - Coin's Financial School (1894)
- 3) Frank Baum - The Land of Oz (1900)
- Silver became a symbol of the common man
- Nation was split
- Populists and Democrats vs. Republicans
- rich vs. poor
- Northeast vs. South and West
- Candidates
- Rep - William McKinley
- sided with business
- favored high tariffs
- favored gold standard
-
- Dem - William Jennings Bryan
- favored workers and farmers
- favored low tariffs
- favored silver standard
- favored regulation of business
- favored the income tax
- "cross of gold" speech
- Populists - Bryan also
- but, Dems chose Arthur Sewell, a banker, as VP
- Populists chose Tom Watson
D. The Campaign of 1896
- McKinley
- ran a "front-porch" campaign supported by "Old Guard", spent $7 million!
- spent millions on campaign literature and other speakers
- Bryan
- evangelical oratory style
- traveled 18,000 miles by train
- made 600 speeches to over 5 million Americans
- spent only $300,000
-
E. McKinley Triumphs
- Results
- Bryan
- 6.5 million votes - more than any previous candidate yet he lost
- 176 elect.
- McKinley -
- Bryan lost 1896 due to lack of support in the Northeastern cities
- (big business and banks put pressure on employees and debtors to vote
Rep!)
- Significance
- Demise of the Populists, but birth of Progressive Movement
- Republicans became the party of choice until 1932
- controlled the House and Senate
- deadlock broken
- parties began to develop differences
- "Coming of Age" for "Modern America"
- The silver issue became moot
- new methods of mining gold (cyanide)
- and new discoveries (Alaska) found
- in 1900 - Congress passed the Gold Standard Act
- Temporary Agricultural Prosperity - 1900 - 1920
- increase in supply of gold caused inflation
- crop failures in Europe and Asia increased foreign demand
- heavy immigration increased consumption at home
- Farmer prosperity returned (good harvests, droughts in other parts of
the world)
- Progressives - Populist ideas lived on
- 1. middle class
- 2. urban
- 3. intellectual
- 4. muckrakers
- 5. T.R.
- 6. Progressives adopted ideas of Populists
POPULISTS
#1 - 1983
- DBQ - (In the period 1880-1900), "explain the reasons for agrarian
discontent and evaluate the validity of the farmers complaints."
#2 - 1989
- In what ways were the late-nineteenth-century Populists the heirs of the
Jacksonian Democrats with respect to overall objectives AND specific proposals
for reform?
#3 - 1995
- Analyze the reasons for the emergence of the Populist movement in the late
nineteenth century.
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