Exam 2 Flashcards
Why Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner labeled the post-Civil War era the “Gilded Age”
Political corruption and corporate greed characterized the period.
Voter turnout during the Gilded Age
was 70-80% even in the South, where the disenfranchisement of the African Americans was not yet complete.
The Pendleton Civil Service Act
A growing percentage of all federal jobs would now be filled on the basis of competitive examinations rather than political favoritism. The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act was thus the vital step in a new approach to government administration that valued merit over partisanship.
The Interstate Commerce Commission
Since the late 1860’s, states had adopted laws regulating railroads, but in 1886 a Supreme Court decision in the case of Wabash St. Louis and Pacific Railroad Company v. Illinois, the justices denied the right of any state to regulate rates charged by railroads engaged in regulating the rail industry. In 1887 Cleveland signed into law an act creating the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC). The law empowered the ICC’s five member to ensure that freight rated had to be “reasonable and just”. The commission’s actual powers proved to be weak, however, when tested in courts, in large part because of the vagueness of the phrase “reasonable and just.”
Farmers and overproduction
the source of farmers problems was a long decline in commodity prices, from 1870 to 1898, caused by overproduction and growing international competition for world markets. The vast new land brought under cultivation in the West poured an ever-increasing supply of farm products into the market, driving prices down.
Why the populists endorsed an 8 hour workday and immigration restrictions
The Populists platform endorsed the 8 hour workday (rather than 10 or 12) and restriction of immigration in an effort to win support from urban factory workers, whom Populists looked upon as fellow “producers”. the Populists farmers wanted to enlist the support of labor as well.
The People’s party 1892 Omaha platform
also known as the Populist Party included the sub treasury plan, unlimited coinage of silver, an income tax whose rates would rise with personal income levels, and federal control of the railroads on their platform. The Populists also called for the government to reclaim from railroads and other corporations lands “in excess of their actual needs” and to forbid land ownership by immigrants who had not gained citizenship. The Populists were very radical, in some ways even for today.
William Jennings Bryan and the 1896 Presidential campaign
Bryan and the campaign of 1896 - that he was the first candidate since Andrew Jackson to champion the poor, the discontented and the oppressed against the financial and industrial titans. He was the first leader of of a major party to call for the expansion of the federal government to promote the welfare of workers and farmers. He called for regulation of railroads, legalizing strikes, taxing the rich and attacking the trusts. He wanted to ban corporate campaign contributions and bring about prohibition of alcohol. In many ways, he was the first Progressive, or Liberal.
His positions gained him the nomination of the Populist Party as well as the Democratic Party. (page 674)
Finally, in a major break with precedence, he tirelessly campaigned for president in an era that viewed this as undignified and unseemly. He criss-crossed the country, making numerous appearances in front of millions of voters, something that just wasn’t done before. It electrified his followers and scandalized his detractors.
William Jennings Bryan and the Cross of Gold speech
The messianic Bryan then stretched his finger across his forehead and reached his dramatic conclusion: “You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold!” Bryan extended his arms straight out from his sides, posing as if being crucified. The New York World reported “Everybody seemed to go mad at once. The day after his riveting speech, the unlikely but righteous Bryan won the presidential nomination on the fifth ballot, but in the process the Democratic party was fractured.
The Mississippi plan of disenfranchisement
MS led the way to the near-total disenfranchisement of blacks and many poor whites as well. The state called a constitutional convention in 1890 to change the suffrage provisions included in the Radical Republican constitution of 1868. The so-called Mississippi Plan set the pattern that seven more states would follow over the next twenty years. First, a residence requirement—two years in the state, one year in an election district—struck at those African American tenant farmers who were in the habit of moving yearly in search of better economic opportunities. Second, voters were disqualified if convicted of certain crimes disproportionately involving blacks. Third, all taxed, including a poll tax, had to be paid before a person could vote. This proviso fell most heavily on poor whites and blacks. Fourth, all voters had to be literate.
Plessy v. Ferguson
In the 1880’s, TN and MS required railroad passengers to occupy the car set for their race. When LA followed suit in 1890, dissidents challenged the law in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson, which the Supreme Court decided in 1896. The test case originated in New Orleans when Homer Plessy, an octoroon (a person having one-eighth African ancestry), refused to leave a whites-only railroad car when told to do so and was later convicted of violating the law. The Supreme Court ruled in 1896 that states had a right to create laws segregating public places such as schools, hotels, and restaurants. Justice John Marshall Harlan, a Kentuckian who had once owned slaves, was the only member of the Court to dissent from the ruling. He stressed that the Constitution is “color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law.” He feared that the Court’s ruling would plant the “seeds of race hate” under “the sanction of law.” That is precisely what happened. The shameful ruling in the Plessy case legitimized the practice of racially “separate by equal” facilities.
Homer Plessy had a very light complextion, and “passed” for being white. This was the reason he was recruited to set up the test case. He agreed to buy a ticket and then sit in the white car. The railroad was notified in advance and had instructed the conductor to ask Mr. Plessy if he was indeed a negro. As rehearsed, he replied in the affirmative and was arrested and removed from the railcar to start the case moving toward the Supreme Court.
Lynching of blacks in the South
From 1890 to 1899 lynching in the United States averaged 188 per year, 82 percent of which occurred in the south. From 1900 to 1909 they averaged 93 per year in which 92 percent was in the south. Whites were 32 percent of the victims during the former period but only 11 percent in the latter. Lynching usually involved a black man accused of a crime. White mobs would seize the accused, torture, and kill him often by hanging but always in ghastly ways and lynching became so common that participating whites viewed them as forms of outdoor recreation.
Booker T. Washington
By the 1890’s, Booker T. Washington, born in Virginia of a slave mother and white father, had become the foremost black education in the nation. He argued that blacks should not focus on fighting racial segregation. Instead, they should first establish an economic base for their advancement before striving for social equality.
Remember, by focusing on what we would today call vocational training, he wanted black Americans to focus on economic gains rather than social equality. “ The wisest among my race understand that the agitation of questions of social equality is the extremest folly.” He became the leading black spokesman, or at least was viewed that way by whites.
W.E.B. Du Bois’s opposition to Booker T. Washington
. Washington called for patience and temporary acceptance of segregation and disenfranchisement. DuBois called for immediate equality both in civil and political rights. The other major difference was over education, where Washington supported learning the “manual arts” or as we call it today, vocational training aimed at getting a job as a laborer. DuBois advocated the traditional college route to develop leaders who could obtain his goals of equality.
The differences between Washington and Dubois were deep. Washington told black people to accept second class status until they gained economic strength. Dubois called for immediate political and social equality. Washington emphasized a vocational education, Dubois advocated a traditional college education.
They represented the two sides of the civil rights debate: militancy vs. conciliation, separatism vs. assimilation, social justice vs. economic opportunity.
Western imperialism in the late nineteenth century
Western imperialism and industrial growth generated a quest for new markets, new sources of raw materials, and new opportunities for investment. The result was s wide-spread process of aggressive imperial expansion into Africa and Asia. Beginning in the 1880’s, the British, French, Belgians, Italians, Dutch, Spanish, and Germans used military force and political guile to conquer those continents. Each of the imperial nations, including the US, dispatched missionaries to convert conquered peoples to Christianity. As the European nations expanded their control over much of the rest of the world, the US also began to acquire new territories.
Alfred Thayer Mahan
Captain Mahan had become a leading advocate of sea power and Western imperialism. In 1890 he published The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783, in which he argued that national greatness flowed from maritime power.
Mahan defined maritime power as overseas commerce, a strong navy to protect it and colonies to provide basis to support the navy. He also advocated a canal accross Central America to make it easier for the navy to get to from the Atlantic to the Pacific or vice versa.
Queen Liliuokalani
In 1891, Queen Liliuokalani ascended the throne and tried to eliminate the political power exercised by American planters. Two years later Hawaii’s white populations revolted and seized power.
“Yellow journalism”
On February 24, 1895, insurrection broke out as Cubans waged guerrilla warfare against Spanish troops. Events in Cuba supplied dramatic headlines for newspapers and magazines. William Randolph Hearst’s New York Journal and Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World were at the time locked in competition for readers, striving to outdo each other with sensational headlines about every Spanish atrocity in Cuba, real or invented. The newspapers’ sensationalism as well as their intentional efforts to manipulate public opinion came to be called yellow journalism. Hearst wanted a war against Spain to catapult the US into global significance. Once war was declared against Spain, Hearst took credit for it.
The de Lome letter
The de Lome letter pushed Spain and the United States closer to war.
One event took place on February 9 when the New York Journal released the text of a letter from the Spanish ambassador Depuy de Lome to a friend in Havana. In the so-called de Lome letter, which had been stolen from the post office by a Cuban spy, de Lome called President McKinley “weak and a bidder for the admiration of the crowd, besides being a would-be politician who tries to leave a door open behind himself while keeping on good terms with the jingoes of his party.” De Lome resigned to prevent further embarrassment to his government.
The battleship Maine
- quickly on the heels of the de Lome letter, the Maine exploded and sank with a loss of 260 American sailors.
- The explosion was blamed on the Spanish, although later investigations ruled it an accident.
- Public opinion was further inflamed against Spain.
- McKinley basically turned the situation over to Congress, and war was declared.
Theodore Roosevelt during the Spanish-American War
Roosevelt helpd raise the Rough Riders, but his importance as well as the Rough Riders was that they were involved in the July 1 victory against the Spanish that basically ended the land war in Cuba. Roosevelt was elevated to the role of the single most famous hero of the war.
Emilio Aguinaldo
the leader of the Filipino nationalist movement, declared the Philippines independent on June 12, 1898. With Aguinaldo’s help, Dewey’s forces entered Manila on August 13. The Spanish garrison preferred to surrender to the Americans rather than to the vengeful Filipinos.
America status as a result of the Spanish-American War
The U.S. was deemed a great world power; a colonial empire of its own, and emerged as an imperial power.
Atrocities during the Philippine-American War
The American effort to quash Filipino nationalism lasted 3 years, eventually involved some 126K U.S. troops, and took the lives of hundreds of thousands of Filipinos (mostly civilians) and 4,234 American soldiers. It was a sordid conflict, with grisly massacres committed by both sides. Within the first year of the war in the Philippines, American newspapers had begun to report an array of atrocities committed by U.S. troops—villages burned, prisoners tortured and executed. Thus did the United States alienate and destroy a Filipino independence movement modeled after America’s own struggle for independence from Great Britain.
US troops actually used waterboarding for the first time here.
