Who is Working in the Factories of Big Business? Yes “native” men,

but also…. Immigrants Children Women

(anyone the factory owner did not have to pay as much as the male head of household)

Collectively, the “working poor”/ low class

Life in the Factory Dirty Crowded 12 hour day 6 days a week Mind-numbing,

tiring, and monotonous

Not to mention dangerous and debilitating

SWEATSHOPS

Company Town The plant owner owns the housing in the

town where workers work. Workers, paid in company scrip have to live

on company property. Shop at the company store. Why does this lead to workers falling into

debt?

FILM: 10 Days that Unexpectedly Changed America: The Homestead Strike ENTRY #17(10/9/15) What was the worker response to

low pay, long hours, and poor working/living conditions? What was the Industrial Response to the workers’ effort to unionize, etc?

The Workers Fight Back Created Unions in

order to fight for their rights.

Unions used collective bargaining in order to get, better wages, conditions, hours, rights.

Important Union Vocabulary Strike: Where workers stop working in

order to get something they want such as higher wages or better benefits.

Scabs: workers hired to replace union strikers.

Yellow Dog Contract: you sign a contract saying that you will not join a union at your place of work.

Lockout- When factory owner closes factory to break up a labor movement before it gets organized.

Blacklist – lists of pro-union workers circulated among employers

Knights of Labor

Formed 1869 Very ideological Welcomed all

workers regardless of industry or race

By 1885 had 700,000 members

American Federation of Labor: AFL

Formed 1886 From skilled craft

unions. Worked for “bread and

butter issues”: more pay and better hours.

Leader Samuel Gompers

By 1901 I million members

1877 Railroad Strike

Starts with B. and O. Railroad when wages cut.…spreads to 11 states (2/3 of US rails and 500, 000 workers).

Federal troops (Hayes is President) sent in to end the strike.

100+ killed, setting precedent for Violent strikes

Haymarket Square Riot

May 1, 1886 At a strike for an

8 hour work day a protester throws a bomb and kills a policeman.

Riot Ensues Dozens of people

are killed. Discredits the

Knights of Labor.

Homestead Strike 1892 wages are cut at one of Carnegie’s

steel plants and the workers go on strike.

The Plant manager, Henry Frick, calls for a lockout and hires a private police force to protect the factory and scabs against strikers (Pinkerton Security Agency) who kill several strikers, but who are ultimately defeated and beaten/humiliated by strikers

A striker tries to shoot Frick Leads to people viewing the Unions

poorly, marking an end to union activity for decades

Pullman Strike 1894 - At the Pullman

plant the management cut wages by ¼ and laid off workers, but did not cut the company town rent.

Massive strike led by union leader, Eugene V. Debs, which again shut down the rail industry in this country…

Pullman Strike Ends

The government issued an injunction (order to go back to work); strike was halted by federal troops; and Eugene Debs was arrested (under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890)

His conviction was upheld by Supreme Court case, In re Debs (1895) – Sherman Anti-Trust Act

He went into prison a Union leader and came out a Socialist (socialism => economic philosophy that calls for an end to private control of property and income)

1890 Sherman Anti-Trust Act Said that organizations could not

impede trade. Meant to be used against

monopolies. BUT used mostly against Unions

early on. Ex. Pullman Strike and Debs

ENTRY # 18

1. Use your imagination, if you were a union leader in a strike against the railroad company what information would you include in your memo to the other Union members. Why?

2. Why did employers generally opposed to Labor Unions?

Warm Up

Why were immigrants more likely to settle in urban, industrial centers rather than rural, agricultural regions?

A Housing was plentiful. B Factories provided much-needed

jobs. C Immigrants knew nothing of

farming techniques. D Immigrants could receive

citizenship quicker.

The New Immigrants Immigrants from

the 1870s were mostly from Eastern and Southern Europe.

Fleeing repeated wars and religious persecution.

Late 19th Century immigration also included many Chinese immigrants

Immigrant Experience Very long journey in

the hold of a ship. Steerage class:

uncomfortable, cramped crowded.

The cost of ticket often cost an entire lifesavings

Upon arrival, met with a processing gauntlet and uncertain future

Ellis Island First Stop for

immigrants coming from Europe to the East Coast.

Processing facility that could take all day or days and included health and “mental” testing.

Angel Island In San Francisco

Bay, A first stop for immigrants from China/Asia

One had to prove that they were either already an American citizen or had family in the United States.

People could be held for months at a time.

Hostility in the United StatesNativism: Anti

immigrant sentiment (feeling)

Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882: banned immigration from China and limited the civil rights of Chinese in the US.

ENTRY # 19

Do you agree or disagree with the statement that the United States is/was a “melting pot,” Explain your answer.

“melting pot” is a metaphor for a heterogeneous society becoming more homogeneous, the different elements "melting together" into a harmonious whole with a new/ unique common culture. It is particularly used to describe the assimilation of immigrants to the USA; the melting-together metaphor was in use by the 1780s

Cities Expand with Immigration and Country-to-City Migration

Urbanization Urbanization- the

growth of cities in terms of size and numbers and at a rapid pace

During this time period the city as we know it began to grow.

Included immigrants from other countries as well as people from within the country.

The Modern City Takes Shape

Skyscrapers: Created office and living space in crowded cities (and the recognizable city sky line) (elevator and steel were key inventions here)

Street Car: allowed lots of people to move around easily; run by electricity

Subways: building transportation underground alleviated crowed streets above ground

Suburbs: people with the money moved out of the dirty crowded inner city to nearby towns.

The Dark Side of the City

With the expansion of cities there were new problems…overcrowding; lack of sanitation; disease; tenement housing; fire and crime

Tenements: low cost, multi-family housing

Tenement conditions were revealed by Jacob Riis in his book How the Other Half Lives…

Ghettos

A part of the city which is inhabited by one specific ethnic group.

The first ghettos were usually eastern and southern European, but Asian Immigrants will soon follow suit.

Little Italy, China Town

City Planning With the expansion of cities there were new

problems…overcrowding; lack of sanitation; disease; tenement housing; fire and crime

The solution was to start planning city expansion ahead of time, instead of just letting the city grow in a hodgepodge way.

Zoning – Different areas of cities used for different

Would include green spaces; better housing; entertainment /sports outlets; skyscrapers; sanitation, police, and fire departments.

Frederick Law Olmstead: Planned NYC Central Park

The Politicians of the Gilded Age Compared to Abraham Lincoln

Presidents of the Gilded Age (1877-1893) seemed especially weak, both in gaining the presidency and in their actions as president.

One Exception: Grover Cleveland, who maintained a reputation for integrity through two terms (1885-1889 & 1893-1897)

Corruption in Gilded Age Politics

This time was possibly the most corrupt period in American politics.

Spoils system – awarding government jobs to loyal party workers, no matter qualified (or unqualified) they were

President Grant’s Administration was especially well known for corruption during his tenure as President (Remember Grantism?):

The Credit Mobilier Affair

The Credit Mobilier was a French construction company that had helped build the Union Pacific RR. The heads of the company were also stock holders of Union Pacific stock, and steered large, fraudulent contracts to their company. They ended up stealing a lot of money from Union Pacific and the government who helped fund the building of the RR. To make sure they didn't get caught, they transferred some of their stock to big-wig congress members. In 1872, congress went to investigate and found that Schuyler Colfax, Grant's VP had accepted stock from the deal. It made the Republican party look super corrupt. Whether Grant knew of this, who knows.

.

The Whiskey Ring Scandal The Whiskey Ring of 1875, exposed by

Secretary of the Treasury Benjamin H. Bristow, involved diversion of tax revenues in a conspiracy among government agents, politicians, whiskey distillers, and distributors. Over $3 million in taxes were stolen from the federal government with the aid of high government officials. Orville E. Babcock, the private secretary to the President, was indicted as a member of the ring but escaped conviction because of a presidential pardon.

The Belknap Scandal overIndian Bureau Contracts Grant’s Secretary of War,

William Belknap, was caught taking bribes to sell lucrative Native American trading posts in Oklahoma to his cronies. Grant let him resign (just before he was to be impeached) and get away with the crimes.

The Political Machine: Government Corruption on the

Local Level An unofficial organization that worked to keep one

politician or political party in power. Most large cities were run by political machines at

the turn of the century. The machine decided who got hired for what jobs

within the city and who got contracts for stuff like roadwork.

In return the machine (and its leaders) got paid with kickbacks (bribes)

This form of corruption is called Graft Political Machines were kept in power by ward bosses

who “served the concerns of the poor urban citizens” and would then tell them whom to vote for

How a Political Machine Worked: A Prime Example The most infamous example of machine politics was

Tammany Hall, headquarters of the Democratic Party in New York City. Headed by William Marcy Tweed, the Tammany Hall political machine of the late 1860s and early 1870s used graft, bribery, and rigged elections to bilk the city of over $200 million. Some of this money went to create public jobs that helped people and supported the local economy. Some went into constructing public buildings at hugely inflated expense, thus lining the pockets of building contractors and suppliers of materials. But contractors and suppliers, and anyone else doing business in the city, had to give kickbacks to the bosses in order to stay in business. Many machine bosses, including Boss Tweed, amassed fortunes as a result of kickbacks and bribes.

Prime Example of Political Machine: Tammany Hall / The Tweed Ring Tammany Hall/The

Tweed Ring kept William Tweed in power in New York.

Gave 50,000 to the poor

2 million for schools orphanages and hospitals

Ran the city’s debt up to 70 million with its graft and illegal practices.