1. Analyze the political significance of the election of 1876

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1 Name: Class Period: Gilded Age Politics, APUSH Guide for American Pageant chapter 23 (You should have already read pages ) and AMSCO chapter 19 (pages only) Directions Print document and take notes in the spaces provided. Read through the guide before you begin reading the chapter. This step will help you focus on the most significant ideas and information as you read. This guide can earn bonus points PLUS the right to correct a quiz for ½ points back. (pictures and election results from WikiCommons, public domain. Pictured are Presidents Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland, Harrison, Cleveland, and McKinley) Students who did not complete the reading guide for the Grant Years are highly encouraged to complete it NOW! There are several key events and people from chapter 23 that were included in that assignment. 1. Analyze the political significance of the election of 1876 Nominee Rutherford B. Hayes Samuel J. Tilden Party Republican Democratic Home state Ohio New York Electoral vote Popular vote 4,036,572 4,284,020 Percentage 47.9% 51.0% The end of Grant s second term marks the end of Reconstruction along with the election that decided his successor and the deal that was struck to get him in office. Rutherford Hayes was declared the winner of the disputed election of 1876, which was dubbed the Compromise of There was a threat of an armed march on Washington by Southern states, but President Grant beefed up the security (military) to protect the capital and discourage rebellion. In the Compromise, the South agreed to acknowledge Hayes as the President, not revolt, and respect Blacks rights. In exchange, the government would remove remaining troops from the South (the end of Radical Reconstruction), build a second transcontinental railroad through the South, appoint a Southerner to Postmaster General, and federal aid to industrialize the South. These last two things didn t happen, however, eventually a new line was built through New Orleans. Did Republicans give up on equality and hand over freedmen to Southern, racist Redeemers in exchange for political support from Southern Democrats? Or did Southern threats of continued violence and rebellion pressure the Republicans to sacrifice their quest for equality in the name of unity once again? Historians disagree. What do you think? 2. Characterize Gilded Age politics. The Presidents of the Gilded Age are often called the Forgeettables. This string of single term presidents begins with Hayes and ends with Cleveland (who served two inconsecutive terms. McKinley is sometimes included in this era as is Grant, but Grant is more significant to Reconstruction era and McKinley to Imperialism, many historians assert. These presidents were more administrators than leaders. The Republican party dominated the era, only Cleveland serves as Democratic President from , but there was a complacency. Explain the significance of each cause for complacency: 1) Political ideology based on limited government Continued on next page

2 Historical significance of causes for Gilded Age, political complacency CONTINUNED 2) Political parties campaign strategies 3) Party patronage 2. Explain the ways and to what extent Gilded Age presidents from Grant through Arthur exemplified Gilded complacency. Gilded Age presidents Ways they illustrated Gilded Age political complacency U.S. Grant Rutherford B. Hayes James Garfield Chester A. Arthur Gilded Age Commentary to what extent was this era good for the country? Remember industrialization and urbanization is happening during these forgettable presidencies Some sage once said that all of human history can be condensed into just two most significant events: the Neolithic agricultural revolution and the modern industrial revolution. I've read some refutations that the first of these actually raised living standards at all (see Gregory Clark's A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World), so if that's true then there's only one event that has substantially changed the material conditions of the way most of the world's people live, and that's the Industrial Revolution. Essentially, the vast bulk of the population lived the same standard of living, the same caloric intake, the same lifespan whether we are talking about Neolithic inventers of farming, pyramid builders, Roman plebeians, medieval serfs, or 18th-century peasants. As far as economic historians know, this was true all around the world, on every continent, in spite of my Eurocentric examples. There were small cycles of income or standard of living, but no secular trend at all, for millennia. Whatever miniscule increase in worldwide wealth there was, was absorbed by the gradual increase in population, the classic Malthusian trap. Then came Britain's industrial revolution, which became the North Atlantic's industrial revolution during the 19th century. Suddenly, in the scope of history, everything changed. The Malthusian trap no longer applied: wealth for the first time began to be created at a pace that fundamentally transformed individuals' lives and societies beyond recognition. More precisely, everything changed there, in far NW Europe at first. The history of the world since 1760 or 1800 has been the uneven spread of wealth creation around the world. In fact, this year I relocated my life from suburban Chicago to the hyper-urbanizing Pearl River Delta in southern China largely so that I could see, experience, be part of the current stage of the world's Industrial Revolution: Literally every day 10s of 1000s of Chinese peasants * are eagerly moving away from millennia of rural poverty eking out an existence pulling a plow behind a water buffalo, dying around age 40 of old age, overwork, malnutrition, or parasitic diseases from the thigh-high waste-water in which the plow is pulled. The amazing truth is that now the poorest person (in an industrialized place) whom any of us will ever personally have a conversation with lives a vastly better, longer, materially comfortable life than even the most ostentatious king or emperor could have lived at any place or time in history up to 200 years or less ago. I could give thousands of illustrative examples, but this one can suffice: Dentistry. Today's industrial poor or the 1880s' industrial poor are yesteryear's science-fiction-level super-rich. In American history we call the time of the fastest improvement of living standards The Gilded Age. Who really thinks the most important thing to teach about that is that Rockefeller and some others got too rich? What really matters about that era is that the vast bulk of the entire population got fabulously, unprecedentedly, science-fiction-level rich by all previous historical standards. (Source: Steven Lauridsen)

3 3. In what ways did the Panic of 1873 and other economic concerns impact Gilded Age politics and illustrate growing tensions between rich and poor? a. DEBTORS sought inflation b. Greenback Party formed c. The Crime of 73 d. Bland-Allison Act e. The tariff debate

4 4. Analyze the political significance of the election of Nominee Grover Cleveland James G. Blaine Party Democratic Republican Home state New York Maine Electoral vote Popular vote 4,874,621 4,848,936 Percentage 48.5% 48.2% Mugwumps were reform-minded Republicans who didn t want James Blaine as their presidential candidate in 1884 because of his dishonest behavior, which included the fishy Mulligan letters. They bolted to the Democrats, receiving their nickname of Indian derivation that suggested that they were sanctimonious or holier-thanthou. What were the Mulligan Letters? How did Grover Cleveland differ from the majority of Gilded Age presidents besides being the only Democrat? 5. In what ways did President Cleveland s leadership impact the nation during his first term? What was the impact of these actions? Implementation of the Pendleton Civil Service Act, Civil Service reform passed under President Arthur in 1881 following the assassination of President Garfield by an insane and disgruntled office seeker. Hundreds of vetoes of private pension bills for Civil War veterans, many of which were false claims of service and/or injury. How did the Pendleton Act change American politics? How did these vetoes impact Cleveland s re-election campaign in 1884? Signed into law the Interstate Commerce Act which began federal regulation of the railroads in This also set up the Interstate Commerce Commission. Signed into law the Dawes Act which began forced assimilation on American Indian reservations, Reclaimed more than 81 million acres of land being occupied by ranchers, cowboys, and railroads. How does this Act illustrate growing influence of the West? How does this Act illustrate the enclosure of the West? How does this reclamation illustrate the enclosure of the West? 6. Analyze the historical significance of the election of Nominee Benjamin Harrison Home state Grover Cleveland Party Republican Democratic Indiana New York Electoral vote Popular vote 5,443,892 5,534,488 Percentage 47.8% 48.6% Benjamin Harrison was the grandson of William Henry Harrison (war hero; Battle of Tippecanoe and president briefly in 1841). He defeated Cleveland, the sitting president, although Cleveland had more popular votes. The main issue was the tariff. Harrison favored protective tariffs and Cleveland wanted them reduced, because he saw them as unfair taxes on consumers. Cleveland came back to win the next election in What is historically significant about that next election?

5 Election of 1888 analysis continued There were three other elections in U.S. history that resulted in the election of a President without majority of popular votes. What were the other three? The Billion Dollar Congress was a two-year, Republican controlled federal government. There was a Republican President, Harrison, and a Republican controlled Congress (both the Senate and the House of Representatives). This Billion Dollar Congress was different than most Gilded groups, because they took a lot of action and acted more as leaders. They are called the Billion Dollar Congress, because it was the first time in American history that the budget reached a billion dollars. Today, BTW budgets are multi-trillion dollars. What were the major achievements of this Billion Dollar Congress and President and to what extent were the actions successful? a. The McKinley Tariff of 1890: b. Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890: Note on McKinley Tariff: The Democrats had pledged to lower tariffs, and protested the McKinley Tariff but by the time the Wilson-Gorman Tariff of 1894 made it through Congress, it was so loaded with specialinterest protection that it hardly made a difference in the McKinley Tariff rates. Cleveland allowed the bill, but the Supreme Court, much to the dismay of the Populists, struck down the income tax provision of the tariff. c. Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890: Note on the Sherman Antitrust Act: Despite being a steop toward challenging trusts and protecting the free market, this act was largely unsuccessful, because politicians were unwilling to truly challenge big business and the neew law was used more to thwart efforts of organized labor than to break up the power of the monopolies trusts. Note on the Silver Purchase Act: Although this was a victory for farmers and other debtors, it was unsuccessful because the increased supply of silver reduced its value which resulted in the inability of miners to make a profit and leading thousands to exchange silver notes for gold notes which led to lack of gold supply.