Politics in the Gilded Age An Era of Corrupt Politicians and Capitalistic Cronyism
Bloody Shirt Politics Directly prior to the Gilded Age proper, the Republicans nominated political neophyte [but Civil War hero] Ulysses S. Grant. The Republicans [barely] got Grant elected by waving the bloody shirt [extolling his Civil War exploits] and using his popularity to put him in the White House. Due to the narrow margin of victory, Republicans learned not to take any potential victories for granted [yuk, yuk ]. No Gilded Age President ever controlled both houses of Congress, so none were able to pursue their agendas very aggressively. In other words, the federal government didn t do much. At all.
The Era of Good Stealings After the Civil War, politicians and businessmen became very cozy bed buddies. Railroad promoters cheated gullible customers, or just plain ripped off farmers. Judges and legislators put their power up for hire. With the federal government sitting around doing very little, the State and local governments became breeding grounds for corruption.
The Era of Good Stealings The infamous Tweed Ring of NYC s Tammany Hall, headed by Boss Tweed, employed bribery, graft and rigged elections to cheat the city of as much as $200 million. Tweed would be caught and imprisoned for his misdeeds when The New York Times secured evidence of his wrongdoings. You know, back when newspapers reported something called the news. The political cartoonist Thomas Nast depicted Boss Tweed in this way. What point do you think he was trying to convey?
The Era of Good Stealings The scandals that rocked the Grant administration set the tone for politics throughout the Gilded Age, from top to bottom: a true carnival of corruption. One of the more famous cases was the Whiskey Ring, which was exposed in 1875. A group of politicians [mostly Republicans] essentially cheated the Treasury Dept. out of millions of dollars of tax revenue. Unlike with contemporary scandals, there was a bit of probing in the Whiskey Ring scandal.
It s Not Monopoly Money: Depression and Inflation Demands In 1873, a financial panic broke out. The panic was caused by the overbuilding of railroads [more than existing markets could bear] and by the over-loaning of funds by banks. In case this makes no sense, it s almost exactly what happened prior to the economic meltdown of 2007, except with railroads instead of houses. Prior to the panic, the greenbacks that had been issued in the Civil War were being recalled; but, during the panic, soft money supporters wanted it back. Because, hey, more money.
It s Not Monopoly Money: Depression and Inflation Demands Supporters of hard money [gold and silver coin] persuaded Grant to veto a bill for more paper money, thus guiding the US toward the gold standard. In 1878, the Bland-Allison Act instructed the Treasury to buy and coin more silver (between $2 and $4 million per month). So, there s more money floating around and that made everybody happy, right? Nope. It made the folks without much money [especially farmers] happy, true, but lots of people [especially bankers] feared it would undermine the economy. But why should we listen to bankers when it comes to money? Yeah, let s listen to the farmers when it comes to economic policy!
Rutherfraud and a Parade of Forgettable Rutherford B. Hayes technically won the presidency in the election of 1876, but due to the scandal associated with his victory over Samuel Tilden, the Republican Hayes vowed to serve only one term. This opened him up to lots of attacks even from those within his own party! So, for 1880, the Republicans picked a pair of Stalwarts, James Garfield [for Prez] and Chester A. Arthur [for Veep.] A portrait of a very somber looking Rutherford B. Hayes. Yep, that s all I have to say.
Rutherfraud and a Parade of Forgettable But before we move on to 1880, there s a catch about 1876 You see, Samuel Tilden won the popular vote. And Tilden was the South s pick for Prez. So If you re going to basically cheat the South out of their Prez [and barely a decade after the Civil War] then you had better offer them something in return, lest they rise again or something. So what did the North give in return? An end to Reconstruction. And with it, the beginning of almost a century of Jim Crow laws, lynchings, and general disenfranchisement of Blacks in the South.
Like the one before it, the 1880 campaign avoided touchy issues, and Garfield squeaked by in the popular vote. Garfield was a good guy, but hated hurting people s feelings. Unfortunately, on 2 July 1881, Garfield was shot by Charles Guiteau, who was a fan of the spoils system that didn t get the political appointment he wanted. Garfield would die a couple of months later, leaving Chester A. Arthur as his successor. Let that be a lesson to all you people pleasers out there!
Not James Garfield, but close [This joke only makes sense if you ve seen MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL.] James Garfield, looking presidential.
Seemingly unfit to be President, Arthur surprised everyone by snubbing the Stalwarts [his chief supporters (and the ones who liked the spoils system so much)] by calling for reform to the existing spoils system. Can t imagine why he would do that, huh? If you haven t figured it out yet, maybe this cartoon of Charles Guiteau will help you a bit.
President Chester A. Arthur, looking a bit pensive Perhaps he was worried that by signing the Pendleton Act into law he was asking for another Charles Guiteau to come along and bust a cap. Or maybe he just let those rockin sideburns do his worrying for him.
The Pendleton Act of 1883 the Magna Carta of civil service reform established a merit based system of making appointments to political office. Theoretically, this ended patronage [aka the spoils system, aka the Hey, I m in power, so I can give all my schmuck friends who aren t qualified to pick their noses a really important government job! system] and made people earn their status. What a concept! The Pendleton Act partially divorced politics from patronage, but it drove politicians into marriages of convenience with big business.
In the election of 1884, the two people vying for the Presidency would be a pair of reformminded candidates: James G. Blaine and Grover Cleveland. After the Democrats nominated Cleveland, it was leaked that he had fathered an illegitimate child. Hello, scandal! A similar episode kept the Democrats from even allowing John Edwards to attend their convention in 2008! Wow, we ve gotten really stuffy as a nation in some ways, huh? Except for Miley Cyrus and her wrecking ball, that is.
THE PARADE OF FORGETTABLE PRESIDENTS In one of the more blatantly mudslinging campaigns the nation has seen, the Republicans attacked Grover Cleveland s supposed integrity, as shown in the cartoon to the right. Were it not for Blaine having accepted political contributions of a questionable nature, he might have won. In case you can t read it, the baby is screaming I WANT MY PA! If only the Maury Povich show had been around.
Grover Takes Over I have people skills!!! Oh, come on they do look at least a little bit alike. [And this joke makes (more) sense if you ve seen the movie OFFICE SPACE.] Grover not the one from Sesame Street.
Business loved Cleveland because he supported laissez faire policy. This extended to his own presidency, since he did almost nothing of note for two years. Congress did pass the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887, tho, so there s that. After four years, it s time for another election. The one in 1888 settled around one issue: tariffs. Republicans managed to convince voters that their endorsement of high tariffs [and their candidate] was better than Cleveland, and so
Benjamin Harrison gets into the White House. After four years away, Republicans were eager to return to power. But they had problems in Congress since not many of them were there. The 51 st Congress, under the helm of Thomas B. Reed, would become the first to spend a billion dollars [on projects and whatnot] and ended up passing some significant acts, besides. Nice poker face, Mr. President.
THE PARADE OF FORGETTABLE PRESIDENTS But it s not as impressive a poker face as Peter Griffin s! Alas, Harrison would essentially gamble away the surplus of wealth Cleveland left.
Since the Gilded Age didn t do much, it was up to Congress to act on behalf of the people. This guy [the 6 3 Speaker of the House, Thomas Reed] got it done. One such act was the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890, a pioneering [but weak] attempt to deter monopolies. Another was the Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890, which boosted the amount of silver coined [more than the Bland- Allison Act did].
The Populist Challenge of 1892 In 1892, the Democrats nominated Grover Cleveland and the Republicans nominated Harrison, but the real news was the entry of the People s Party [aka the Populist Party]. The Populists [made up mainly of former Grangers] demanded: Free and unlimited coinage of silver, A graduated income tax, Government ownership of railroads, Direct elections of US Senators, and The use of initiatives and referenda to propose legislation.
Though the Populists managed to get over a million votes, they never really posed a threat as a third party, and Grover Cleveland was sent back to the White House. Almost as soon as he s sworn in, the Panic of 1893 began, the first of the new industrial age. Thousands of businesses and lending institutions collapsed within six months of the Panic s outbreak. Cleveland inherited a deficit, and thanks to legal issues the Treasury had to pay gold for the notes it had issued under the Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890. Gold supplies in the Treasury dipped below $100 million.
The US repealed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, but this only partially solved the problem. By 1894, the gold reserve stood at a meager $41 million! To avoid going off the gold standard [and risking total financial collapse], Cleveland asked JP Morgan for help. Morgan convinced Wall Street to loan the government $65 million in gold [half from abroad]. This did not please the silver fans. Why not? [I mean, what gives, silver fans? Morgan saved the day!]
When the election of 1896 rolled around, the Republicans turned to the silver-tongued orator William McKinley to get into the White House. The Democrats, on the other hand, were in disarray until William Jennings Bryan, the Boy Orator of the Platte, came to their rescue. At the Democratic National Convention, Bryan made his famous Cross of Gold speech in favor of free silver. It was so rousing, he got nominated for the Democratic ticket the next day!
The architect of McKinley s campaign, a wealthy businessman named Mark Hanna, thought he could make the tariff the key campaign issue, but Bryan made it silver. Unfortunately for Bryan, his ideas didn t win him any friends with the social elites, whose savings would have been cut in half by his free silver plan. Hanna spent plenty of money on a campaign to smear the free silver ideas, and the public seemed to agree that such ideas were bad for the still-struggling economy. Democrats accused Hanna of buying the election, naturally.
THE CROSS OF GOLD Before we take a look at an excerpt of the Cross of Gold speech, let s take a look at this political cartoon. What s going on in the cartoon? What is it saying about Bryan? Is it a cartoon that is favorable to him or critical of him? What evidence supports your position?
McKinley won decisively, getting 271 electoral votes [from the East and upper Midwest] to Bryan s 176 [mostly from the South and West]. Republicans would control the White House for the next sixteen years. During that time, the middle class would keep their comfy lifestyles, and the farmers would end up getting the short end of the stick, as usual.
Just as McKinley came to power, prosperity returned to the nation as the Panic of 1893 was running its course. Wonder who took the credit? The Gold Standard Act was passed in 1900. Hooray. We re off to see the Wizard, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz! [You do know that follow the yellow brick road is a reference to staying on the gold standard, right?] Yeah, THE WIZARD OF OZ is a Populist parable.