3. Reform in the Gilded Age
Gilded Age
Period after Civil War
Lasted from 1870s through 1890s
Age of serious problems hiding under shiny surface
Political Concerns
Americans feared industrialists & wealthy men were
enriching themselves at expense of public
Corruption/Dishonesty in government
Bribery & voter fraud appeared widespread
4. Taming the Spoils System
Source of corruption was Spoils System
Practice of rewarding political supporters w/ gov’t jobs
W/ election of new President, people swarmed to Washington
looking for jobs in rewards for their political support
1881
James Garfield elected President
4 months later was shot by disappointed office seeker
Sparked efforts to end spoils system
Vice President Chester A. Arthur became President
Owed his rise to spoils system
1883
Pendleton Act signed
Created Civil Service Commission
A system that includes most gov’t jobs, except elected positions, the
judiciary, & the military
Aim was to fill jobs on basis of merit
Jobs went to those who scored highest on civil services examinations
5. Controlling Big Business
Late 1800s
Bigbusiness influenced politics, often w/ bribery
Americans demanded limiting power of railroads &
monopolies
Congress
UnderConstitution has power to regulate interstate
commerce
1887
President Grover Cleveland signed Interstate Commerce Act
Forbade practices such as rebates & set up Interstate Commerce
Commission to oversee railroads
6. 1890
President Benjamin Harrison signed Sherman Antitrust
Act
Prohibited businesses from trying to limit or destroy
competition
Difficult to enforce
Judges often ruled in favor of trusts & the Sherman Act was used
to limit the power of labor unions (strikers blocked free trade &
threatened competition)
7. Corruption in the Cities
Expansion of cities led to expansion of
sewers, garbage collection, & roads
City politicians often excepted money to award jobs to
friends
Powerful politicians (bosses) controlled work done
locally & wanted payoffs from businesses
Popular w/ poor
Gave turkeys & coal
Poor voted for them in return
8. William “Boss” Tweed
1860s & 1870s he
cheated NY City out of
$100 million
His crimes were
exposed by
journalists, before
being arrested he fled
to Spain
Hewas arrested in
Spain & died in jail in
1878
9. Progressives & Political Reform
Progressive Movement
Corruption led to rise
Progressives: diverse group of reformers united by a belief in the
public interest
Not sacrificed to greed of huge trusts & city bosses
Wisconsin idea
1st to adopt Progressive reforms
Governor Robert La Follette “Battling Bob”
Opposed political bosses
Appointed commissions of experts to solve problems
Railroad commission recommended lowering railroad rates; as rates
decreased, rail traffic increased
1903 Wisconsin was 1st state to adopt a primary run by state gov’t
officials
1917 all but 4 states joined
10. More Power to Voters
Recall
A process by which people may vote to remove an
elected official from office
Easier to remove corrupt officials
Initiative
Process that allows voters to put a bill before a state
legislature
Voters must collect a certain # of signatures on a petition
Referendum:way for people to vote directly on a
proposed new law
11. Two Constitutional Amendments
Progressive Reformers
Backed graduated income tax (method of taxation that taxes people at
different rates depending on income)
Wealthy pay higher taxes than poor
Supreme Court ruled this was unconstitutional
16th Amendment (gives Congress the power to pass an income tax) was
ratified in 1913
1789
U.S. senators were elected by state legislatures
Bribery was a problem
Progressives wanted people to vote for senators
1913
17th Amendment was ratified to require the direct election of senators
12. The Muckrakers
Press play important role in exposing corruption
President Theodore Roosevelt
Compared these reporters to men who raked up dirt/muck in
stables
Muckraker became a term for a crusading journalist
Ida Tarbell
Targeted big business
Work led to demands for more controls on trusts
Accused oil baron John D. Rockefeller of unfair business methods
Other reporters described how corruption had led to
inadequate fire, police, & sanitation services
Jacob Riis
14. 1906
Upton Sinclair’s novel The Jungle
Grisly details about the meatpacking industry
Described how packers used meat from sick animals & how rats
often got group up in the meat
16. The First Progressive President
September 6, 1901
President William McKinley assassinated by
unemployed anarchist @ the world’s fair in Buffalo, NY
Vice President Theodore Roosevelt became President
42 years old
Youngest President to take office
Supporter of Progressive goals
17. Teddy Roosevelt
Came from wealthy NY family
Suffered from asthma as child
Built strength by lifting
weights, running, & boxing
@23 he was elected to NY state
legislature
Served on Civil Service Commission
Headed NYC police department
Assistant secretary of the navy
1898
Led U.S. troops in daring exploits
against Spain
Returned home a hero
Elected governor of New York
2 years later was elected VP w/
McKinley
18. TR & Big Business
TR won reputation as trustbuster (a person working to destroy monopolies &
trusts)
Was not against big business, saw difference between “good” & “bad” trusts
Good trusts: were efficient & fair & should be left alone
Bad trusts: took advantage of workers & cheated the public by eliminating competition.
Gov’t must control or break them up
1902
Gov’t brought lawsuit against Northern Securities Company (was formed to
control competition among railroads)
TR said NSC used unfair business practices
1904
Supreme Court ruling: NSC violated Sherman Antitrust Act
Order: trust to be broken up
1st time Sherman Antitrust Act used to break up trusts, not unions
More suits followed
Against: Standard Oil & American Tobacco Company
Were later broke up because they attempted to limit free trade
19. A Boost for Organized Labor
TR also clashed w/ mine owners
1902
PA coal miners strike
Wanted: better pay & short workday
Owners: refused to negotiate w/ miners’ union
w/ winter approaching schools & hospitals ran out of coal
TR threatened to send troops to run mines
Mine owners negotiated w/ miners union & reached
agreement
TR 1st President to side w/ strikers
20. The Square Deal
1904
TR ran for President
Promised a Square Deal
Everyonefrom farmers and consumers to workers and
owners should have the same opportunity to succeed
Helped him win election
21. Conserving Natural Resources
TR took action to protect wilderness areas
Lumber companies were cutting down entire forests
& miners were removing iron & coal, while leaving
gaping holes in the earth to keep up w/ industrial
growth
TR loved the wilderness & pressed for conservation
Not against using resources, but believed they had to
be used wisely, w/ an eye toward the future
1905
U.S.Forest Service was formed
Thousands of acres of land set aside for national
parks
22. Protecting Consumers
Sinclair’s novel The Jungle shocked TR
He made public a report exposing unhealthy
meatpacking plant conditions
1906
Congress passed a law allowing closer inspection of
meatpacking houses
Muckrakers
Exposed drug companies for making false claims about
medicines & adding harmful chemicals to canned food
Congress passed Pure Food & Drug Act (required food & drug
makers to list all ingredients on packages
23. Taft & Wilson
1908
TRdid not run for reelection
Supported William Howard Taft
Trouble For Taft
Taft:
quite & cautious
Was wary of power
Supported Progressive causes
Broke up more trusts, favored graduated income
tax, approved safety rules for mines, created federal office
to control child labor, & signed laws giving gov’t workers 8
hour workday
24. 1909
LostProgressive support
Signed a bill to raise tariffs
Progressives argued this raised prices for consumers
Modified conservation policies
Progressives accused him of blocking conservaton
25. Election of 1912
TR broke away from Taft & ran against him for Republican
nomination
TR was loved by people, but Taft controlled party leadership
Taft nominated by Republican Party
TR & supporters formed new party
Progressive Party, later known as the Bull Moose Party
Democrats chose Woodrow Wilson
Progressive candidate
President of Princeton University & governor of New Jersey
Brilliant scholar & cautious reformer
Known as begin rigid & unwilling to compromise
TR & Taft gained more votes than Wilson, but spilt Republican vote
allowing Wilson to win the election of 1912
26. Wilson & the New Freedom
Wanted to restore free competition
Program called New Freedom
Persuaded Congress to create Federal Trade Commission
Power to investigate companies & order them to stop using unfair
practices to destroy competitors
1914
Clayton Antitrust Act signed
Banned some business practices that limited competition
Stopped antitrust laws from being used against unions
Federal Reserve Act
Regulated banking
Set up a system of federal banks and gave government the power to
raise or lower interest rates & control the money supply
28. Women Win the Vote
Seneca Falls Convention of
1848
Markedstart of women’s rights
movement
Elizabeth Cady Stanton &
Susan B. Anthony
Formed National Woman
Suffrage Association after C.W.
Wanted right for women to
vote
29. Women Vote in the West
Late 1800s
Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, & Idaho allowed women to
vote
Recognized women’s contributions made to build farms &
cities by allowing them to vote
1890
Wyoming applied for statehood
Congress wanted to bar women from voting
Wyoming lawmakers stood firm & was admitted with
women being able to vote
30. Growing Support
1900s
Women’s suffrage grew
5 million women worked
outside the home
Paid less, but wages gave
them some power
Demanded say in law
making
Carrie Chapman Catt
Developed way to win
suffrage state by state
Suffragists: people who
worked for women’s rights to
vote followed her plan
Efforts brought steady gains
31. The Nineteenth Amendment
Women right to vote
In some states it did not apply to federal elections
Call for federal amendment to allow women to vote in all elections
Alice Paul
Met with President Wilson in 1913
Explained suffragists were committed to achieving a federal amendment
Wilson pledged support
1919
19th Amendment passed
Guaranteed women right to vote
August 1920
¾ of states ratified the amendment
19th Amendment
Doubled # of eligible voters
32. New Opportunities for Women
Women also struggled to gain access to jobs &
education
Were refused licenses to practice law or medicine
Higher Education
A few women managed to get higher education to
enter a profession
1877
Boston University granted first Ph.D. to w woman
1900
1,000 women lawyers & 7,000 doctors
33. Women’s Clubs
At First
Read books & sought ways to
advance their knowledge
In time many became reformers
Raised money for
libraries, schools, & parks
Pressed for laws to protect
women & children, ensure pure
food & drugs, and win the vote
African American women formed
own clubs
National Association of Colored
Women
Battled to end segregation &
violence
Joined battle for suffrage
34. Women Reformers
Progressive Era
Some women committed themselves to reform
Became social workers to help the poor
Florence Kelley
Investigated
sweatshop conditions
Became chief factory inspector in Illinois
Main concern was child labor
Organized boycott of goods produced in factories
employed by young children
35. Crusade Against Alcohol
1820s
Reform against alcohol abuse
Women took leading role
1874
Woman’s Christian Temperance Union
Frances Willard became president
Spoke about evils of alcohol
Wanted state laws to ban sale of liquor
Worked to close saloons
Later joined suffrage movement w/ other WCTU members
Carry Nation
More radical temperance crusader
Husband died from heavy drinking
Often stormed into saloons swinging a hatchet & smashed beer kegs & liquor bottles
Actions gained publicity, but embarrassed WCTU
1917
18th Amendment passed by Congress
Enforced prohibition (a ban on the sale and consumption of alcohol
Ratified in 1919
37. African Americans
Discriminated against in North & South
Landlords refused to rent homes in white areas
Restricted to worst housing & poorest jobs
38. Booker T. Washington
Born into slavery
Self educated
Worked in coal mines & attended
school when he could
1881
Helped found Tuskegee Institute in
Alabama
Offered industrial & agricultural
training
Advised African Americans to
learn trades & to move up
gradually in society
Practical approach won support
from Carnegie & Rockefeller
Helped build trade schools
Presidents also sought his advise
on racial issues
39. W.E.B. Du Bois
1st African American to receive
a Ph.D. from Harvard
Agreed with Washington on
needing training
Disagreed with him on
accepting segregation
Urged black to fight
segregation
1909
Joined w/ others to form
National Association for the
Advancement of Colored
People (NAACP)
Worked for equal rights for
blacks
40. Campaign Against Lynching
More than 1000 African Americans in the south
were victims of lynching: murdered by a mob
after the depression of 1893 violence worsened
Ida B. Wells
an African American journalist
talked about free speech in her articles
urged African Americans to protest against lynching
also called for a boycott of segregated streetcars
and white-owned stores
41. Setbacks and Success
• President Wilson supported segregation and thought of it as a
benefit
• Despite challenges, some African Americans prospered
– George Washington Carver
• Discovered hundreds of new uses for peanuts and other crops in the South
– Sarah Walker
• Created line of hair products for African American women
• Was the 1st American women to earn more than $1 million
– Black owned insurance companies, banks, and other businesses
server African Americans
– Black colleges trained young people
– Churches became training ground for generations of African
American leaders
• African Methodist Episcopal Church
42. Mexican Americans
• 1900
– ½ a million Mexican Americans lived in U.S.
• Faced legal segregation like African Americans
• 1910
– San Angelo, Texas
• Built new schools for Anglo (of English ancestry) children
• Mexican children forced to attend separate, inferior schools
• When Mexican children tried to attend one of the new
schools, officials would not let them
43. Increased Immigration
• 1910
– Revolution and famine swept through Mexico
– Thousands fled to the U.S.
• All levels of Mexican society - poor farmers, middle
class, and upper class
– 90% of Mexican Immigrants lived in the southwest at
first
• Migration later spread Mexican Americans to other parts of
the country to find work
44. Daily Life
• Mexican immigrants as farmhands, built roads, or dug irrigation
ditches
– Some lived near R.R.’s they helped build
• Other Mexican Americans worked in factories under harsh conditions
– Paid less than Americans
– Denied skilled jobs
• Sought to preserve culture & language
• Created barrios (ethnic Mexican American neighborhoods)
– LA home to nation’s largest barrio
• Within Barrios Mexican immigrants & Mexican Americans helped
each other
– Some formed mutualistas (mutual aid groups)
• Pooled money to pay for insurance and legal advise
• Collected money for the sick and needy
45. Asian Americans
• The Chinese exclusion act of 1882 led to
employers on the west coast in Hawaii to
hire people from Asian countries, mostly
from Japan and the Philippines.
46. Japanese Immigrants
• More than 100,000 Japanese immigrants
traveled to the U.S in the early 1900’s
• Some went to Hawaii to work on sugar
plantations
• When the U.S. annexed Hawaii in
1898, Japanese sought a better life in the
mainland.
∙ most became farmers that settled on dry
barren land that the Americans didn’t want.
• Japanese built up their farms and began to
produce most of California's fruits and veggies.
47. A Gentlemen's Agreement
• Asians were out casted.
• In the 1900’s, san Francisco forced all Asian students
even children to attend different schools than white
students.
• When Japan protested the issue, it threatened to cause
an international crisis.
• Unions pressured Theodore Roosevelt to limit the
immigration from Japan.
• He refused and tried to hush the turmoil between
Japanese and Americans.
• He proposed the idea that if san Francisco ended there
segregation he would limit the Japanese immigrants
48. • In 1907 Roosevelt created a
gentleman's agreement with Japan.
• Japan agreed to stop workers from
going to the U.S and the U.S agreed to
allow Japanese women to join their
husbands and family already in the U.S.
• The anti-Japanese feeling remained
high.
• In 1913 California banned Asians who
were not American citizens from
owning land.
49. Religious Minorities
• Religious minorities faced deep prejudice
• Roman Catholics and Jews were included in the immigration boom.
• Nativist groups such as the Anti-Catholic American Protective
Association (ACAPA) worked to restrict immigration.
• Jews and Catholics who were not immigrants face discrimination in
jobs and housing.
• A feeling of Anti-Catholicism was common in schools.
• Some teachers lectured against the Pope, and textbooks with
references to “decitful catholics”
• American Catholics set up parochial schools, or schools sponsored by
a church.
• 1913
• Anti-Semitism, or prejudice against Jews, took place in Georgia.
• Leo Frank
• Jewish Man
50. He was falsely accused of murdering a young girl.
Despite lack of evidence, he was sentenced to death.
Although the Governor of Georgia reduced his
sentence.
A mob took him form prison, and lynched him.
In response to the lynching, and Anti-
Semitism, American Jews founded Anti-Defamation
League.
The League worked to promote understanding and
fight prejudice against Jews.
