The Gilded Age:
Politics & Society: Overview
Political corruption at national and local levels
- Party machines rule
- Racial politics an important factor
- "waving the bloody shirt"
- "Solid South" emerges: Democrats powerful
- Politics and economics merge
Corruption & Dirty politics
US Grant: poor leader, many of his advisers corrupt
Scandals involved government insiders interest in railroad building (Credit Mobilier), Whiskey Ring, selling material to Indians
Bribery "graft" rampant at the local leve
Garfield: victim of spoils process
Cleveland & Blaine: mudslinging election of 1884
End of Reconstruction, 1877
Deal made to resolve 1876 pres. election
Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) & Samuel J. Tilden (Democrat) both short of electoral vote majority
Election commission set-up to decide election
Deal: Hayes takes office & military reconstruction ended, subsidies for southern RR line, bi-partisan presidential patronage involved
Changes/Reform Efforts-1870’s Politics
Republican revolt-1872: anti-Grant, anti-corruption "Liberal Republican" reform effort
Horace Greeley nominated as Democratic candidate
Rise of "greenbackers" and "mugwumps" & "silver money" advocates
Beginnings of Grange & labor political movements
Party Machines
Local party bosses/organizations run city governments
bribery, kickbacks in contracting, maintaining voter allegiance
Tweed Ring set tone for cities across country
Eric Goldman: "Government as a vast and succulent barbecue"
Party Machine
* Party Leaders *
Election of 1884
Memorable for dirty campaigning
vs. Cleveland: "Ma ma, where’s my pa?"
vs. Democrats: "Rum, Romanism, Rebellion" - bloody shirt waved
Blaine: linked to RR scandals
Significance: issues, style of campaign typical for period
Politics & Economics
Rise of big business interests & political mobilization of labor
Protectionism: key issue -tariff issue in 1880’s Harrison supports higher tariff
Laissez-faire is the key philosophy throughout the period
Civil Service job reform: Chet Arthur (in Garfield’s footsteps): Pendleton Act of 1883 (p.525)
Politics of Ethnicity
Racial politics in South: KKK intimidation, "black" Republicans (party of Lincoln) - Jim Crow laws in place
Immigrant question - Irish ("Romanists") - Chinese ("yellow peril")
Chinese Exclusion Act - passed in 1882; severe restrictions on Chinese immigration to US
Nativism in 1870’s & 1880’s
Based on racism: (anti-Asian), anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic
Economic concerns often at the heart of it: fear of job competition: railroad workers in west, miners & factory workers in east, Midwest
powerful political issue through early 20th century (at least)
Conclusion Questions
How did late 19th-century politics set a tone for the 20th century?
How did late 19th-century politics reflect broader socio-economic changes?
What ways were politics of era adequate for time? Inadequate?
Is nativism still a strong factor in American politics & society? explain