Thinking the People

The Problem of Inequality

• Was concentrated economic power a threat to freedom and democracy?

– Ex: railroads, financiers, monopolies, “robber barons”

• Was American Dream an illusion?

Doubts about Democracy

• Poor could vote to take from the rich• Political corruption• Danger of regulation (8 hour workday)• “Social Darwinism”

The Courts Agree

• Lochner v. New York (1905)– Made limits on work hours illegal

• Coppage v. Kansas (1915)– OK’d “yellow dog” contracts

• Issues injunctions to break strikes

The “Labor Question”

• Economic mobility no longer possible?• Permanent class of factory workers?• Unionization?

The Knights of Labor

• 800,000 members at height (1886)• First union to include skilled and unskilled,

blacks, women, etc. (except Asians)• Capitalists=the new “slave power”

The War in the Streets

• 1886: 350,000 rally for 8-hour day• Ironworkers strike in Chicago• Police kill strikers

The Haymarket Massacre

The Haymarket Massacre

• Bomb attack during protest• Police again open fire• Activists raided and arrested• 8 anarchists convicted on thin evidence

What’s the Matter with Kansas?

• Farmers unhappy too• Growing debt– To pay for fertilizer, equipment, etc., esp. in West

• Declining prices for crops– Competition from abroad

The Chickens Are Restless

• Farmers’ Alliance – Founded in TX, late 1870s– Biggest movement of 19th century

• Wanted farmers not to depend on banks• Finance and market their own crops

The People’s Party

• aka the “Populists”• Establishes newspapers, sends speakers

throughout countryside • Traditional vision of the small producer

“Cyclone” Davis Mary Elizabeth Lease

“raise less corn and more hell”

The Pops’ Platform (1892)

• Direct election of Senators• Graduated income tax• Public ownership of railroads• Right to unionize

The Populists’ Challenge

• Break two-party system• Attempt to unite urban workers and rural

farmers• Black and white farmers in the South vs. white

supremacist Democrats

The Cross of Gold

• Populists join w/ Dems to support William Jennings Bryan for President in 1896

• Famous speech:– “You shall not press down upon the brow of labor

this crown of thorns. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.”

The Money Issue

• Populists and Dems rally behind “free silver”

• Republicans and big business support William McKinley and “sound money”/gold standard

• Republicans win big