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The Growing U.S. in the late 1800’s/early 1900’s
Industrial Revolution & the Gilded Age
Industrial Advantages of the U.S.
1. Growing labor supply (immigrants & children)
2. An abundance of natural resources (iron, oil, electricity)
3. Free enterprise – business that is free from govt. involvement
2nd Industrial Revolution
� Laissez-faire capitalism – little govt. regulation of the economy
� Entrepreneurs – people who organize their own business
� Labor was mostly immigrants (paid cheap) or poor children
� Because of this, the U.S. became the industrial leader in the world during the 1890’s
Monopolies
� Total control of a business or product (just like the game)� consolidating corporations to control the market for a product
� attempting to destroy the competition
� controlling the majority of the production & distribution of a product
� robber barons – polarization of wealth; businessman who dominated their respective industries
� Andrew Carnegie – STEEL
� John D. Rockefeller – OIL
� Sherman Antitrust Act – outlawed monopolies. But it was difficult to enforce
Andrew Carnegie John D. Rockefeller
Economic Ideologies
� *Capitalism – private business own & operate most industries; competition determines cost of goods as well as workers’ pay
� Government favored business in most disputes with its labor force
� Social Darwinism – societies evolve over time by adapting to their environment; govt. regulation threatened the natural economic order (survival of the fittest)
Growth of Cities
� Increase in immigrants
� Port of entry = Ellis Island, NY & Angel Island, CA
� Most were Roman Catholic
� Led to racial & ethnic problems (ex. Wops, Pollocks)
� Movement from rural to urban life (more people living in the city)
� Jobs available in the cities
� Led to overcrowding & lack of city services – sanitation problems
Immigrants at Ellis Island
Settlement Houses
� Neighborhood centers in poor areas staffed by professionals and volunteers who offered education, recreation, and social activities
� Jane Addams – founded the most famous settlement house, called Hull House in Chicago.
� Hull House focused on the needs of families and immigrants. Teaching citizenship and English.
Hull House
Jane Addams - activist
Discrimination & Civil Rights
� Chinese Exclusion Act
� U.S. fed. law restricting Chinese for 10 years & any Chinese American could not obtain U.S. citizenship; reaction to open immigration
� Plessy vs. Ferguson
� Plessy (1/18th black) was thrown off railway car & arrested for violating Separate Car Act of Louisiana
� U.S. Supreme Court case upholding racial segregation; “separate but equal”
� practiced until 1954
Fighting for Civil Rights
� Booker T. Washington� 1st Civil Rights leader (original MLK); author� believed in cooperation w/ whites instead of confrontation� his work greatly helped lay the foundation for the 1960’s
Civil Rights Movement � W.E.B. DuBois
� publisher & author of equality writings; encouraged Harlem Renaissance; director of NAACP
� “blacks should challenge and question whites, seek higher education, & assimilate into American culture”; they should know when to act “white” and/or “black”
� Marcus Garvey� founder of Universal Negro Improvement Association
(uniting all of Africa)� Africans redeem Africa from European foreigners & return
home
The New Workplace
� Machines replaced skilled workers
� mass production – large amounts of products being made
� Immigrants taking jobs
� Labor Unions grew � They increase workers’ power (power in numbers)
� Used as a bargaining tool against employer to get what workers want (collective bargaining)
� Taft-Hartley Act – fed. law passed that monitors activities & powers of labor unions
Labor Unions
•American Federation ofLabor –they
IndividualizedUnions
(ex. Mineworkers,Steelworkers); open
to only skilled workers
� Knights of Labor
- Open to
everyone – men, women, skilled & unskilled workers;
one big union
Labor Union Rallies & Strikes
� The Bisbee Deportation – in AZ; the Industrial Workers of the World demanded change in the copper mines, the Bisbee mining corp. refused; violence erupted – 2 men were killed, others beaten - the IWW members were deported to NM; the Bisbee company was never found guilty for their injustice
� The Haymarket Riot – 1000s of union members in Chicago went on strike; 2 strikers were killed by police; workers protested; turned violent – 8 officers killed; officers killed several people; another example of unfair labor laws
Labor Dispute & Strikes
� Homestead Strike
� Pennsylvania (1892); between Amalgamated Assoc. of Iron & Steel Workers (AA) – the whole town & Carnegie Steel Co.
� AA wanted to prevent management from forcing workers to agree not to become a member of a union… got violent
� Union VICTORY!!!
� Pullman Strike
� nationwide conflict between unions & RRs (1894); violence erupted in Illinois with Pullman Palace Car Company & American Railway Union
� President Cleveland ordered fed. troops to Chicago to end strike (he was not reelected); RRs won!
Populist Party (The People’s Party)
� Supported free coinage of silver, labor reform, immigration restrictions, & govt. ownership of RR & the telegraph/telephone system
� Most populists were farmers and industrial workers (the common people) that were losing jobs and $$$ to immigrants & big business
� William Jennings Bryan – a democrat & populist presidential candidate in 1896. He lost. This election marked the end of the populist movement.
Progressive Reforms
� all laws were designed to give the people greater control over their state legislatures & state officials
� Amendments:� 16th – income tax� 17th – direct election of senators� 18th – prohibition� 19th – women’s right to vote
� Election reforms:� Recall – if enough voters sign a petition, the people can
remove the official� Initiative – voters’ ability to propose new laws by petition� Referendum – voters approve or disapprove laws already
being practiced
Corruption
� Machine Bosses bought voter support with jobs & favors� reached out to immigrants by finding jobs attaining
citizenship, housing, etc. � in return, expected their vote
� used illegal tactics to maintain control (bought votes)
� demanded bribes & pay offs for jobs
� Tammany Hall, a.k.a Tweed Ring� most notorious political machine� stole millions of tax dollars
� Spoils System
muckrakers
� Progressivism – reformers who wanted to address city life & corruption in order to achieve order & stability
� Journalists who practiced progressivism named, “muckrakers” – bc they raked up the muck of society & exposed corrution & illegal business practices
� Ida Tarbell – wrote about unfair business practices of the Standard Oil Co.; book: History of Standard Oil Company
� Jacob Riis – wrote about slum life & business corruption; book: How the Other Half Lives
� Upton Sinclair – wrote about unsanitary working conditions; book: The Jungle
� Frank Norris – discussed how railroads were a monopoly
� Lincoln Steffens – exposed corruption in city govt.
Theodore Roosevelt –Progressive President
� “Trustbuster” – broke up trusts (a group of companies under a single board of director that make a lot of $$$, there’s no competition)
� Land conservation –doubled the number of national and state parks
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