The "Bloody Shirt" Elects Grant:
- Republican party nominated Grant 1868 "let us have peace"
- Democrats all agreed they were against military reconstruction. Wanted more money in circulation and lower interest rates. Nominated Horatio Seymour.
- Republicans "waved the bloody shirt" - revived gory Civil War memories and reminded that the Republican party was Lincoln's party of the Union.
- Grant won - got all the black votes
The Era of Good Stealings:
- Corruption!
- Jim Fisk and Jay Gould - "Black Friday" 1869, bid priced of gold up -> Treasury had to release gold. Grant wasn't crooked, just stupid.
- Tweed Ring - bribery and fraudulent elections $200 million. Thomas Nast published evidence against Boss Tweed, and he was prosecuted by Samuel J. Tilden. Tweed went to prison.
A Carnival of Corruption:
- "Spoils system" and favor-seekers of Grant
- Credit Mobilier scandal 1872 - Union Pacific Railroaders hired themselves at inflated prices. Distributed shares to Congressmen and VP so goverment wouldn't blow the whistle.
- 1874-1875: Whiskey Ring - robbed Treasury of excise tax revenues. Grant defended his private secretary, who was involved.
- 1876 Secretary of War William Belknap guilty of pocketing bribes from suppliers to Indian reservations, Grant reluctantly made him resign.
Pallid Politics in the Gilded Age:
- Political see-saw delicately balanced between parties. But party-followers were devout.
- Republians: Puritanism, strict moral codes, believed grovernment should regulate conomic and moral affairs.
- Democrats: Lutherans and Roman Catholics, toleration of differences, against goverment imposing moral standard.
- Democrats: South, N industrial cities (immigrants)
- Republicans: Rural and smalltown NE, Freedmen in the South, Grand rRmy of the Republic (Union veterans)
- => Factions: "Stalwart" led by Roscoe Conkling embraced civil-service for votes (spoils system). "Half-breeds" led by James G. Blaine for civil-service reform. STALEMATE.
The Hayes-Tilden Standoff, 1876:
- Grant wanted to run for a 3rd term, but House voted against it 'two-term tradition'
- Republicans nominated Rutherford B. Hayes - from swing state of Ohio
- Democrats nominated Samuel J. Tilden (bagged Boss Tweed)
- Some disputed electoral states, who should tally the votes, Republican president of Senate, or Democrat Speaker of the House?
The Compromise of 1877 and the End of Reconstruction:
- 1877 - Electoral Count Act - set up electoral commission of 15 men from House, Senate, and Supreme Court.
- 8 Republicans and 7 Democrats - Republican majority vote. Democrats outraged - launched a filibuster.
- Deadlock avoided by the rest of the Compromise of 1877 - Democrats (reluctantly) agreed that Hayes take office if federal troops are withdrawn in the 2 remaining states (LA and SC). Republicans also said they'd make a transcontinental railroad through Texas.
- Republican party quietly abandoned commitment to racial equality.
- Civil Rights Cases - 1883 - Court declared 14th amendment only prohibited government violations of civil rights - not individual ones.
- Grant elected and last soldiers removed.
Birth of Jim Crow in the Post-Reconstruction South:
- White Democrats took control of the South
- Blacks forced into sharecropping and tenant farming. "Crop-lien" system - storekeepers extended credit in return for portion of harvests
- Discrimination against blacks grew into state-level legal codes of segregation - Jim Crow laws
- Literacy reqs and voter registration laws ensured black disfranchisement - validated by Supreme Court Plessy vs. Ferguson 1896.
Class Conflicts and Ethnic Clashes:
- Railroad presidents cut wages by 10% (1877) - President Hayes called federal troops to stop unrest in striking laborers. Workers vs. soldiers - 100 people died. Great railroad strike failed.
- Many Chinese in Cali - to work on gold and railroad.
- Irish resented Chinese - competition for cheap labor
- congress passed Chinese Exclusion Act 1882 - prohibited immigration from China until 1943.
- Birthright citizenship important to Chinese and other immigrants.
1 comment:
The Democrat stance on military reconstruction has changed now hasn't it?
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