2. All that glitters is not gold
Political paralysis in the Gilded Age Chapter 23 American Pageant, 13th ed.
All that glitters is not gold

3. Immigration & Urbanization
After the Civil War…
Reconstruction
( )
Gilded Age
( )
Industrialization
( )
Immigration & Urbanization
( )

4. The Gilded Age A time period from 1870-1900
Gilded: covered in gold on the outside, but made of cheap material inside
Gilded Age covers the last part of Reconstruction, Industrialization and the height of immigration & urbanization
Gilded Age saw the good (growth & rich culture) and the bad (poverty, corruption & crime)

5. Mr. President Ulysses S. Grant (R) elected President 1868 Illinois boy
NOT a politician
Elected by “waving his bloody shirt”
Corruption abounded!
Black Friday
Tweed Ring
Crédit Mobilier Scandal
Whiskey Ring

6. Black Friday
Jim Fisk and Jay Gould bought up gold to increase price, enlisted the help of Grant’s brother-in-law
Grant got wind and sold $4million of US government gold, price plummeted
Hurt many investors

7. Boss Tweed & Tammany Hall
Political machine in New York
Used immigrants as basis
Jobs & assistance for votes
Thomas Nast & New York Times published scathing information
Tweed served time in the pen for fraudulent activity

8. Crédit Mobilier Scandal
Insiders in Union Pacific Railroad (government funded) had formed a construction company - Crédit Mobilier
They hired themselves as a contractor
Charged outlandish fees
Kept Congressmen quiet by handing out shares of Crédit Mobilier, the Vice President Schulyer Colfax
No prosecutions occurred

9. Whiskey Ring Excise tax on liquor increased to pay Civil War debts
Distillers bribed officials and received cuts in the amount of taxes paid
US Treasury put an end to it, but over 100 officials were convicted
President Grant’s personal secretary was involved but received no punishment

10. “Grant”ed the Presidency again
Grant won re-election in 1872
Economic Panic of 1873 – rebuilding and reconstructing had left people in debt & no one was spending money
Politically, things were balanced
Citizens were voting in droves (80%)

11. Election of 1876 Samuel Tilden (D) vs. Rutherford Hayes (R)
Tilden won popular vote; Republicans contested 20 electoral votes
Of the 20 votes Tilden only needed one vote; Hayes needed all 20
15 person commission appointed to “count” contested votes
Passed the Compromise of 1877
Hayes was President
Federal troops were to be withdrawn from permanently from the South

12. Race & ethnic conflicts
Hayes let the South do its thing
Jim Crow set in: poll taxes, literacy tests, lynching, tenant farming…
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882

13. Election on 1880 James Garfield (R) won with Chester Arthur as his VP
Garfield was shot by Charles Guiteau at a railroad station
Garfield survived for 11 weeks & died in Sept. 1881
Arthur finished the term

14. Election of 1884 & 1888
Grover Cleveland (D) elected; first Dem since Buchanan (30 yrs ago)
Laissez-faire philosophy
Wanted lower tariffs to spur economic growth (lower prices); campaign issue for 1888
Benjamin Harrison (R) won in 1888

15. Populists enter the political scene
Populists or “People’s party”
Based in agriculture
Helped to split the Democrat & Republican votes in 1892 election
Grover Cleveland back again – only President reelected after a defeat (two non-consecutive terms)

16. The American Dream Individualism emerges as driving force in America
“I can get a great job and rise above everyone and everything!”
Horatio Alger embodied individualism

17. Social Darwinism
Spencer used Darwin’s idea of evolution and applied it to human society
“Survival of the fittest”
Those who can make it will, those who can’t won’t