1. Early calls for political and social reforms came not from the cities, but rather from the western farmers
2. As the Gilded Age went on, American farmers began to see their farms as agricultural factories, and tried to maximize profits.
3. In the old days, farmers tried to be self sufficient -- or at least regional
4. After the Civil War, an agricultural revolution came to the Mississippi River Valley, and farmers soon found they could concentrate on a single crop, such as corn or wheat.
5. Instead of growing everything they needed, farmers could now buy things at the general store
6. Reminder -- new technology in industry and food, combined with the new mass advertising, made the general store more important and consistent
7. Farmers could even order manufactured goods from new catalogs (Montgomery Ward's and Sears and Roebuck)
8. As farmers became businessmen, this change brought them into contact with railroads, banks and other expanding businesses.
9. These were not the yeoman farmers from Jefferson's time, but were more like Agricultural Businessmen.
10. The Agricultural revolution also drove many smaller farmers off the land and into the industrial workforce, thus decreasing the population of rural areas, even as the cities grew with the influx of immigrants.
11. Problem -- when farmers specialized in one crop, they fell into the trap that caught southern cotton planters before the Civil War -- if prices were high, they made money, but a surplus could trigger lower prices, and thus a fall in income.
12. Agriculture was even more susceptible to foreign competition than other businesses. If wheat growers in Russia, Argentina or Canada could grow and sell their crops at a cheaper rate, farmers in the USA would go bankrupt.
13. As the industrial revolution went on, prices got cheaper and cheaper -- although demand grew as well, supply outstripped the need.
14. Farmers were caught in a real problem -- in order to try to make it, they were forced to grow even more, which drove down the price and drove them deeper in debt.
15. By 1880 -- 25% of American farms worked by tenants and sharecroppers who worked the land, but were no better than American peasants -- banks and other businesses were making a profit on American farmers
16. Finally, the farmers struck back.
17. National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry -- The "Grange"

• Farmers organization started in 1867 -- sort of a "farmers union"
• Primary objective in the early days was to stimulate the farmers intellectually and develop a real sense of community (real help to women on the plains)
• Gradually moved into organization of farmers and political action
• Important in both the West and the South -- old natural alliance
• Tried to regulate railroad rates and agricultural prices (class discussion on whether or not this was legal)
• Never fully organized farmers like labor -- too many problems with small rural communities

1. People's Party (Populists)

• Grassroots political movement organized at the local level as a third party in the early 1890s
• Looked as though a true third party would emerge -- one based on the farmers
• Real challenge to both Republicans and Democrats -- remember that the farmers from the West and the South formed a natural alliance
• 1892 -- Populists meet in Omaha to nominate a presidential nominee
• demanded free and unlimited coinage of silver and gold at a 16:1 rate
• called for an income tax (redistribution of wealth)
• government ownership of telephone and telegraph
• government ownership of the railroads
• nominated old Union General James Weaver
• tried to appeal to industrial workers of the East
• polled over 1 million popular votes and 22 electoral votes
• PROBLEM -- POPULISM IN THE SOUTH SPLIT ALONG RACIAL LINES -- BY 1892, THE "BOUBONS" OF THE SOUTH (PLANTERS) WERE WORRIED ABOUT LOSING THEIR POWER TO A NEW WHITE / BLACK FARMERS ALLIANCE (POPULISM), SO THEY MADE SURE THE OLD MUDSILL IDEA WAS BROUGHT OUT. TO MAKE SURE BLACKS DIDN'T VOTE (MOST DIDN'T), POLL TAXES AND LITERACY TESTS WERE ENACTED IN THE EARLY 1890S, WHICH EFFECTIVELY BARRED BLACKS FROM VOTING, EVEN THOUGH THEY COULD UNDER THE 15^TH AMENDMENT. IRONICALLY, THE POPULIST MOVEMENT HELPED BRING LEGAL SEGREGATION TO THE SOUTH AS WELL, SOMETHING THAT DIDN'T EXIST BEFORE THE MID 1890S.

1. During the last 3 decades of the 19^th century, while the country's economy was in a state of growth and flux, economic downturns were common. Businesses would make huge profits and suffer huge losses. Without government regulation, business cycles were common.
2. There were basically two schools of thought then, as there are now.

• Big business -- leave the cycles alone and make sure the country is backed up by "hard money" (a dollar in gold for every paper dollar printed)
• Farmers and Miners -- need government intervention and redistribution of wealth -- "soft money" -- print more paper -- in the absence of more paper, at least the government could coin more silver, a mineral that would help miners

1. "Silverites" called for the free and unlimited coinage of silver, at a 16:1 ratio of gold.
2. In reality, the silver issue was a topic that affected few people, but the silver question came to symbolize the class division in America.
3. Populists and some Democrats supported free silver, while Republicans supported the Gold Standard and "hard money"
4. Note -- explanation in class about the US dollar, its value and our gold reserves
5. 1892 Omaha platform (Populist) -- supports free silver -- attempt to carry both farmers and miners
6. The issue came to the forefront starting in 1893 -- the US goes into its worst panic of the 19^th century
7. Grover Cleveland, the Democratic president, was a conservative and supported Big Business (no real difference between the big two national parties at the time -- that's what made the Populists so dangerous as a third party) -- he believes in gold and laisez faire economics
8. Populists gained support and looked to 1896 for their chance to elect a president

1. Democrats in 1896 refused to support the incumbent president, Grover Cleveland, and were split over the silver issue. Many in the party wanted to take a hard line silver stance to win back the populists, but others wanted the government to support the gold standard.
2. Republicans -- William McKinley (Ohio) -- puppet of Marcus Hanna (rich iron baron who sought to control the presidency through McKinley) -- platform called for support of the gold standard -- backed by the business world --
3. At the Democratic convention in July in Chicago, Cleveland was dismissed and the silverites took control. All they lacked was a leader.
4. 36 year old William Jennings Bryan (Nebraska) stepped to the podium to give a speech in support of the silver issue. At the time he was not even a presidential candidate
5. Cross of Gold Speech -- electrified the convention -- Silverites had their leader -- Bryan was nominated the next day
6. Populists -- endorsed Bryan -- fade away as a party -- Democrats stole their issue
7. Republicans throughout the campaign warned factory workers that they would lose their jobs if Bryan won
8. Hanna amassed a huge war chest and spent money like it was going out of style in an effort to defeat the popular Bryan
9. Bryan traveled around the country -- making about 600 total speeches (36 in one day) -- he championed himself as a man of the people
10. Businessmen told their workers not to come to work if Bryan won -- they would simply shut the factories down -- the tactic worked -- factory workers in the northeast (who should have supported Bryan) voted for big business and McKinley
11. McKinley swept to victory -- the US stood solidly behind the gold standard

1. Supreme Court Case decided in 1896 -- most people didn't really pay attention to it at the time
2. Case was over segregated railroad cars
3. Court decided that "separate but equal" facilities did not violate the 14^th amendment's clause of "equal protection" of the law
4. Set legal precedent for segregated society in the South -- in everything from railroad cars to schools to lunch counters
5. Law of the land until 1954 and Brown v. Board decision

1. By mid 1890s -- most of Africa divided up by European powers -- review of European Imperialism and the "Scramble for Africa"
2. At the same time, American businessmen looked to the western hemisphere as a market for the new goods of the industrial age
3. Other Americans, including many "yellow press" newspaper editors, believed in social Darwinism and the right of Uncle Sam to control the earth.
4. These types of Americans looked on in horror as Europe divided up colonial possessions in Africa and Asia
5. Hawaii --

• 1820 -- first New England missionaries arrive -- christianize the natives and bring American ideas
• over the years, Americans began to move to the islands and set up plantations -- by the 1880s, these men controlled much of the kingdom's economy
• 1887 -- Hawaii grants the US naval base rights at Pearl Harbor
• 1893 -- whites organize a successful revolt, openly assisted by American troops
• new Hawaiian government applied to the US for annexation
• like Texas in 1836, however, the issue touched off debate, this time over imperialism
• Hawaii was finally annexed in the American rush to imperialism in the wake of the Spanish American War (1898)

6) Spanish American War

• Focused on Cuba -- Governed by Spain since Columbus discovered the island in 1492 -- often misgoverned and abused
• Americans had looked to Cuba for expansion since the 1830s
• 1895 -- Cuban masses take to the streets -- revolution against Spain
• Yellow Press journalists, such as William Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer, tried to outdo each other in reporting "atrocities". When none existed, they could be invented
• The Yellow Press drove the country into a war fever
• Early 1898 -- US dispatches the USS Maine, on a "friendly visit" to Havana Harbor
• 15 Feb 1898 -- Maine explodes
• US officials determined that the explosion was caused by an underwater mine
• Spanish officials claimed that it was an internal explosion (they were right)
• 11 Apr 1898 -- Congress declares war on Spain
• 01 May 1898 -- Commodore Dewey sails into Manila harbor and destroys the Spanish fleet in the Philippines without losing a man (remember -- it's easy to conquer and hard to control)
• 13 Aug 1898 -- American army takes Manila (note date)
• The American army was not prepared for war, but went anyway
• Theodore Roosevelt -- Asst. Sec. of the Navy -- organizes a group of volunteers called the "Rough Riders", which he personally leads
• Middle of June -- about 17,000 US troops cluster in Tampa, Florida (including both the Rough Riders and two black regiments)
• 01 July -- troops land near Santiago, Cuba -- fighting broke out almost immediately
• the Spaniards were even more disorganized than the Americans, if that was possible.
• Fierce fighting broke out on San Juan Hill -- Rough Riders stormed the hill in a famous charge led by TR -- the two black regiments, although barely mentioned in the military reports, actually did most of the fighting
• TR -- became a military and American hero -- he made sure of it
• The Cubans welcomed the American army as an army of liberation --
• McKinley had said publicly that Cuba would be given independence
• 12 August 1898 -- Spanish sign an armistice -- shortest war in American history
• American deaths -- 385 to bullets -- almost 5000 to malaria and yellow fever (spread by mosquitoes)
• Treaty of Paris (1898) -- ends 400 year Spanish rule in the Americas
• Cuba declared free (we will supervise)
• US gets Puerto Rico
• US gets Guam
• US gets Philippines -- idea was to give the "little brown brothers" independence later
• US to pay Spain $20 million for the Philippines (compensation for actually taking Manila one day after the armistice)

1. The Philippines were a real problem for America

• Natural resources ready to exploit
• People wanted freedom and independence -- they had welcomed American troops as liberators
• Annexation would violate the American ideals of the people controlling the government
• The issue split the Senate and threatened the treaty ratification
• Eventually the Senate ratified the treaty with one vote to spare
• Civil War broke out in 1899 against American rule -- viscious fighting -- territory finally subdued by 1902 -- would be taken by the Japanese during WWII and granted independence in 1946

1. Cuba

• US forces withdrew in 1902 (except the military base of Guantanamo Bay)
• Platt Amendment -- amendment to the new Cuban constitution of 1901 -- gave the US permission to "restore order" and provide "protection" against foreign powers -- also gave the naval base of Guantanamo Bay to the US (we're still there -- the agreement can only be revoked by both parties, something we will never do)
• The US will really control Cuba for almost 60 years, until Castro took over in 1959

1. Puerto Rico

• 1900 -- US grants Puerto Rico a measure of self government
• 1917 -- Puerto Ricans granted US citizenship
• the American government set up schools, hospitals and built the island, something the Spanish never did -- still the Puerto Ricans remained very poor
• today -- Puerto Rico is a commonwealth of the United States -- the citizens pay no taxes -- they have only a non-voting member of Congress and no vote for the president -- as of today, about 60% of the population receives a welfare check
• Many Puerto Ricans moved to the United States, especially New York and Boston looking for jobs
• Today Puerto Rico is split politically on the issue of statehood -- many like the idea of no federal taxes

1. With the Spanish American War, America entered an age where it would be forced to be a major player on the world stage. No longer could we merely concentrate on the Americas, although we would try to stay out of Europe's affairs for a while.

1. As 1900 approached, Republicans didn't know what to do with troublesome 41-year-old war hero Teddy Roosevelt.
2. TR was made the vice-presidential candidate -- much to Mark Hanna's consternation -- Hanna knew that if TR ever became president his influence would stop
3. Republicans nominated McKinley and ran on the success of the war
4. Democrats turned again to the champion of 1896, William Jennings Bryan. Silver was no longer an issue as the economy was booming, but Bryan ran on it anyway, and lost votes because of it.
5. The campaign was really about American imperialism
6. Bryan ran on an anti-imperialism platform -- McKinley countered with the notion that Bryan would bring financial ruin to the now booming economy
7. Money and prosperity won the day -- many voters simply chose the lesser of what they saw as two evils. McKinley and Roosevelt might not be good for the Philippines or Cuba, but they were good for jobs in America
8. Republicans saw their victory, however, as a mandate for expansionism
9. McKinley was supposed to run the government -- TR was supposed to be kept in line
10. TR during the campaign set the country on fire with his personality, stealing Bryan's most powerful ally, his presence.
11. People liked this young, brash "Rough Rider" from New York
12. McKinley and TR ran on the platform of prosperity and "freedom" as the US entered it glory days. They portrayed Byran as a naysayer who would bring the country to its knees with his "scheme" of free silver.
13. Popular vote -- 7.2 million for McKinley -- 6.3 million for Bryan
14. Electoral Vote -- 292 to 155 for McKinley

1. McKinley was killed in September 1901 by a deranged anarchist (believes in no government).
2. TR, as vice president, assumed the office with gusto.
3. Hanna's worst dreams were about to come true.
4. TR was know for his "radical" reform ideas as well as his bravado
5. Famous TR quotes:

• "It's better to wear out then to rust out" -- he was always on the go
• "Speak softly and carry a big stick" -- not afraid to use the force of America to carry out his program

1. he was a well educated man (Harvard), born to a wealthy and distinguished New York family.
2. Champion of the military -- TR would undertake the building of America's "Great White Fleet", a naval buildup
3. Took Panama because he could
4. Also an outspoken moralizer and reformer -- tired of the way things "were"
5. "Cowboy Diplomacy" was his specialty, even with Congress and the American People
6. See page 673 for a great cartoon of TR and the "big stick"
7. Roosevelt Corollary -- unofficial TR interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine that said that the US COULD INTERVENE IN LATIN AMERICAN affairs, but Europeans could not. In essence, TR saw himself as the sheriff of the American hemisphere.
8. TR even brokered the peace between Russia and Japan at the end of the Russo-Japanese War in 1905 (Portsmouth Conference)
9. For his diplomatic moves -- TR was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906 -- only added to his stature

1. TR was at heart a reformer -- as were many American Bourgeoisie of his generation
2. He believed the great businessmen of his Father's generation (and most of his political party's leaders) to be built on the backs of poor workers
3. By 1900 -- 1 in 7 Americans was foreign born -- 76 million Americans in all -- over 10 million of them immigrants -- many from southern and eastern Europe
4. Before 1914 -- another 13 million immigrants would arrive -- the largest swell of immigrants as a percentage of the population in American history
5. Most clustered into slum immigrant communities in America's Major Cities -- such as New York, Chicago, Boston and others, where they could find both work and a sense of community-- in class assignment from Jacob Riis' book, How the Other Half Lives (1890)
6. TR was profoundly affected by the early reform movements -- these bourgeois leaders sought to call attention to the plight of those less fortunate
7. Progressive Reform Issues -- often headed by women

• Corrupt city governments
• Women in factories
• Children in factories and mines
• Food safety
• Income Tax (accomplished with the 16^th Amendment in 1913)
• Direct election of US senators (accomplished with the 17^th Amendment in 1913)
• Suffrage for Women (accomplished with the 19^th Amendment in 1920)
• Prohibition of Alcohol -- came from the countryside -- often linked to Nativism as the new immigrants were seen as Roman Catholic drunks (accomplished with the 18^th Amendment in 1918)

1. Progressives came to political power with TR
2. "Square Deal for Labor"

• control (not government ownership) of corporations
• consumer protection
• conservation of natural resources

1. TR was known as a "trust buster" -- he didn't think that most big businesses were moral
2. He went after trusts and corporations all over the business spectrum, from railroads to steel to beef and others
3. Competition, he felt was the American way -- it was good for both business and consumers -- he was determined to use his position as president to make a statement
4. In reality, TR didn't want to break business, but instead wanted government to work WITH businessmen to protect consumers -- that make him different from other, more radical progressives and socialists.
5. The Jungle (1906)

• Book published by Upton Sinclair in 1906
• Dealt with immigrants and the Chicago meat packing industry
• Story of gory details and terrible unsanitary working conditions

1. Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906

• Passed at TR's insistence (after he read the Jungle)
• Designed to clean up the food industry

1. TR also known for his commitment conserving natural resources

• Set aside millions of acres of timber, coal deposits and water resources
• Not necessarily saved for its beauty, but to USE WISELY
• TR is on Mt. Rushmore -- with Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln

1. Election of 1904 -- TR promises only 1 more term -- easily wins over Democratic (Alton Parker) and Socialist (Eugene Debs) challengers
2. TR could have easily won in 1908, but lived up to his 1904 promise and "rode off into the sunset", but not before handpicking a successor --

1. TR's handpicked successor in 1908
2. Largest president in history -- over 350 pounds -- got stuck in the White House bathtub
3. Election of 1908

• Taft (Republican) -- 7.7 million -- 321 electoral
• Bryan (Democrats) -- 6.4 million -- 162 electoral
• Debs (Socialists) -- 420,000 -- 0 electoral

1. TR left on an African Safari after the election -- somehow noone expected anything less
2. Taft was everything TR was not

• Yale man
• Great legal mind -- became Chief Justice of the Supreme court in 1921
• Trusted political administrator
• None of TR's "big stick" mentality
• Actually busted more trusts in 4 years than TR did in 7 1/2, but with less fanfare
• Eventually turned to conservatives in his party for support, thus alienating both TR and Republican progressives

1. Democrats -- Woodrow Wilson (NJ) -- progressive history teacher and president of Princeton
2. Republicans -- Taft -- conservative
3. Progressive Party (formed in 1912) -- TR -- said he was "as fit as a bull moose" -- thus the party's unofficial name is the "Bull Moose Party"
4. Wilson campaigned on a new platform -- called the "New Freedom" -- sought to return the business world to the hands of responsible businessmen -- no social welfare -- vigorous enforcement of antitrust laws and competition in the marketplace
5. TR -- "Bull Moose" -- campaign turned ultraprogressive -- called for social programs such as social security, minimum wage, woman suffrage, government control of business
6. Taft -- campaigned as the champion of stability and conservatism -- not a good move in an age of American progressivism
7. Wilson -- 6.3 million (almost the same as Bryan in 1908) -- 435 electoral
8. TR -- 4.1 million -- 88 electoral
9. Taft -- 3.5 million -- 8 electoral
10. Debs (Socialist) -- 900,000 (highest Socialist Party vote ever)

1. Wilson as a President

• Program called the "New Freedom"
• Intellectual and historian
• True southerner -- sympathized with the plight of the Confederacy -- his progressivism will not be friendly to blacks
• Attempts to control businesses even more then TR or Taft
• Brought real government control over the business sector through a series of important pieces of legislature
• Federal Reserve Act of 1913 -- organized the nation's money system into 12 federal regional banks -- reestablishment of a national bank under Hamilton's old model, which Wilson had studied as a historian -- discuss Fed Reserve in class
• Clayton Anti-Trust Act of 1914 -- gave labor and unions a legal status and legalized strikes and peaceful picketing
• Federal Farm Loan Act of 1916 -- made low interest loans to farmers -- old Populist idea

1. Wilson tried to pull Bull Moose voters (progressive Republicans from 1912) into his fold for 1916 -- he had won as a minority candidate in 1912
2. He also ran in 1916 as a candidate of peace
3. WWI -- breaks out in Europe in August 1914 -- quickly engulfs the world
4. America declared to be neutral
5. Wilson backed away from the Roosevelt idea of controlling the Americas -- it didn't seem right -- WWI was a war over colonies and expansion -- something we had done as well
6. Problem for Wilson -- when war broke out in Europe, the new immigrants were often from the belligerents and had strong feelings on both sides

• Germans -- for Germany
• Irish -- Against Britain, especially after 1916 and the Irish Rebellion
• Italian -- entered the war on the Allied side in 1915 in an attempt to gain land on the Dalmatian Coast (today's Croatia)

1. Most Americans were anti-German, but Wilson declared the US to be neutral in 1914
2. Central Powers -- run by despotic emperors with little democratic freedoms for people
3. The British declared a naval blockade of Germany in 1914
4. Germany retaliated by declaring unrestricted submarine warfare in a area around the British Isles
5. German officials warned Wilson that American ships could be sunk if we continued to trade with Britain (our biggest trading partner)
6. Problem --- Wilson was secretly shipping supplies to Britain
7. 07 May 1915 -- Lusitania sunk off the coast of Ireland -- it's a passenger liner (secretly carrying 4200 cases of small-arms ammunition)
8. many Americans called for war -- Wilson talked big but behind the scenes knew that he had to keep the US out of the fray for now.