Political Paralysis in the Gilded Age Chapter 23… Political Paralysis in the Gilded Age By Derek Evans

The Billion Dollar Congress With Benjamin Harrison and the Republicans now back in control of the White House AND with a majority in Congress, the new Speaker of the House, Thomas B. Reed wielded his mighty influence. Reed was a large, tall man, a tremendous debater, and very critical and quick-witted. To solve the problem of reaching a quorum in Congress, Reed simply counted the Democrats who were present yet didn’t answer to the roll call! After three days of chaos, Reed’s tactics prevailed, opening the 51st, or “Billion Dollar” Congress—one that legislated many expensive projects.

Thomas Reed

The Drumbeat of Discontent The new (and soon to be serious threat) Populist Party emerged in 1892 from disgruntled farmers. Their main call was for inflation via free coinage of silver. They called for a litany of items including: a graduated income tax, government regulation of railroads and telegraphs/telephones, direct elections of U.S. senators, a one term limit, initiative and referendum, a shorter workday, and immigration restriction. Meanwhile, the dismayed Democrats, seeing no alternative, dejectedly re-nominated former president Grover Cleveland…….

Cleveland (again) and Depression Grover Cleveland won the rematch with Benjamin Harrison (unlike what the cartoon implies). Cleveland was the only president to ever serve 2 terms non-consecutively. Unfortunately for him, no sooner had he stepped back into the White House when the Depression of 1892 broke out, the worst financial crisis in U.S. history to that point.

The Depression of 1892 completed the almost predictable (every-20-years) cycle of panics during the 1800s (panics occurred in 1819, 1837, 1857, 1873, and 1893). About 8,000 American business houses collapsed in six months, and dozens of railroad lines went into the hands of receivers. This time around as President, Cleveland now had a deficit...... and another problem - the US Treasury had to issue gold for the notes that it had paid in the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, and according to law, those notes had to be reissued, thus causing a steady drain on gold in the Treasury. The level alarmingly dropped below $100 million at one point. The Homestead Strike, 1892 Three hundred armed Pinkerton detectives floated on barges down the Monongahela River to the site of the Carnegie steel plant at Homestead, Pennsylvania. Met by a defiant and disciplined force of strikers, they were compelled to surrender. Here the Pinkerton men are shown disembarking from their barges after their capitulation, while the jeering strikers ashore exult in their victory.

William Jennings Bryan Meanwhile, President Cleveland had developed a malignant growth under the roof of his mouth, and it had to be secretly removed in a surgery that took place aboard his private yacht; had he died, Adlai E. Stevenson, a “soft money” (paper money) man, would likely have caused massive chaos with inflation. Also, 33 year-old William Jennings Bryan was advocating “free silver,” and gaining support for his beliefs, but an angry Cleveland used his executive power to break the filibuster in the Senate—thus alienating from him the silver-supporting Democrats. William Jennings Bryan

Cleveland Breeds a Backlash Cleveland aroused widespread public anger at having to resort to borrowing $65 million in gold from “Mr. Banking” J.P. Morgan to bale out the depression!

The well-intentioned Cleveland was also embarrassed by the Wilson-Gorman Tariff. He’d promised to lower the tariff, but so many tack-ons had been added, that the result was nil. Further, the Supreme Court struck down an income tax. More and more, it looked like all politicians were nothing but tools for the wealthy as the rich kept on getting richer. There is no doubt that the political developments of the 1890s were shaped mostly by the Depression of 1892, the most severe and extended economic depression up to that time, as we shall soon see…..

Gilded Age Presidents Ulysses S. Grant (1868-1876) – Republican Rutherford B. Hayes (1876-1880) – Republican James A. Garfield (1880-1881) – Republican Chester A. Arthur (1881-1884) – Republican Grover Cleveland (1884-1888) – Democrat Benjamin Harrison (1888-1892) – Republican Grover Cleveland (1892-1896) - Democrat