The Great West and the Agricultural Revolution

"The white man, who possesses this whole vast country from sea to sea, who roams over it at pleasure and lives where he likes, cannot know the cramp we feel in this little spot, with the underlying remembrance of the fact, which you know as well as we, that every foot of what you proudly call America not very long ago belonged to the red man.” Washakie 1878

Indians Embattled In The West

• At the time of the Civil War was a vast unsettled area

• By 1890 territories carved out and Indians being squeezed out

• 1865-1890 final showdown for the independent Indian tribes.

The Clash of Cultures on the Plains

• Industrialization vs. Native Life

• Major plains tribes = Sioux and Cheyenne

• Buffalo = way of life• White Man- kill the

buffalo, kill the Natives

The Clash of Cultures on the Plains

• Whites tried to pacify the tribes by signing treaties with the “chiefs”

• Fort Laramie in 1851• Fort Atchison in 1853. • Beginning of the

reservation system in the west.

• Treaties doomed to failure- Why

The Clash of Cultures on the Plains

• Great Sioux Reservation in Dakota Territory

• Indian Territory = Oklahoma

• Federal agents are corrupt, never truly fulfill promises

• 1/5 of US army = buffalo soldiers

Receding Native Population• Indian wars =atrocities on

both sides• Sand Creek Massacre 1861

– US troops massacre 400 natives (were promised immunity) mostly women and children

• Fetterman Massacre 1866- Natives stop white men from constructing Bozeman trail

Fingers and ears were cut off the bodies for the jewelry they carried. The body of White Antelope, lying solitarily in the creek bed, was a prime target. Besides scalping him the soldiers cut off his nose, ears, and testicles-the last for a tobacco pouch

Receding Native Population

• 2nd Treaty of Fort Laramie 1868, ends construction of Bozeman Trail

• 1874- General Custer finds gold in black hills SD

• Sitting bull leads Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapahos against US troops

• Battle of Little Bighorn 1876- the last significant victory for the Natives

Receding Native Population

• Nez Perce go to war in Idaho in 1877.

• Surrendered • Promised they would

get lands back, instead sent to Kansas reservation (40% die disease)

Receding Native Population

• Apaches • Apache’s in Arizona

and New Mexico were the most difficult to subdue.

• Led by Geronimo. • Ultimately Resettled

in Oklahoma

Receding Native Population

• Natives spirits are destroyed, confined to reservations

• RR’s = ultimate demise, more people and disease

White Man Kill buffalo

• 1865--15 Million buffalo.

• By 1885 fewer than a 1000.

• Whites kill buffalo for sport, furs, or tongues

The End Of The Trail

• 1880’s people are more aware of Natives Plight, why

• Helen Hunt Jackson -- A Century of Dishonor;

• Humanitarians– Christianize the Indians

– Turn them into productive farmers

– Integrate them as citizens.

• Hardliners insisted on forced containment.

The End Of The Trail

• Missionaries are ignorant of native culture – sometimes withhold food until they drop cultural ways

• Ghost Dance• Battle of Wounded

Knee –1890

Failed attempts at assimilation

• Dawes Severalty Act of 1887

• Attempt to transform Indians into good American farmers.

• Major shift in Indian policy. Ends reservation system.

• Carlisle Indian School, PA- “Kill the Indian, save the man”

Failed attempts at assimilation• Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 – (1934)• Dissolved many tribes as legal entities• wiped out tribal joint ownership of land.• Individual family heads given 160 acres of land.• Full title and citizenship in 25 years if behaved

themselves• Leftover reservation land sold; money to be used to

educate and civilize the Indians.• Missionaries and teachers sent to reservations to

Christianize and teach women to sew and keep house.• Completely ignorant of Native ways

Mining: Dishpan to Ore Breaker• Mining brings people out

west• 1849 Cali gold rush• 1858- Pike’s Peak (Colo) –

Pikes Peakers• Comstock load in Nevada in

1859. • Additional smaller strikes in

Montana, Idaho and other Western states.

• Many boomtowns spring up• Rugged individualism –

women are much more independent

Mining: Dishpan to Ore Breaker

• Small-time mining replaced by corporations

• Effect on economy of mining– Helped finance the Civil War

– Facilitated building of the RR

– Reduced the value of silver

Beef Bonanzas and the Long Drive

• 1866-1888 was the era of the Cattle drives

• Beef Barons• RR fuel cattle

industry- now they can ship cattle alive

• Kansas and Chicago are slaughter cities

Beef Bonanzas and the Long Drive

• Long Drives • Cow towns = Dodge

City• Many cowboys, were

minorities • 1890’s long drives

die- Why • Cowboys lose out to

plowboys

The Farmers Frontier • Homestead Act of 1862.• Any adult could claim 160 acres of

public land on certain conditions- live on it for 5 years, improve land, 30 dollar fee

• Huge change in land policy- before land was sold for revenue.

• Half million families use Homestead Act

• Intent was to provide a stimulus to the family farm, seen as the back-bone of democracy.

The Farmers Frontier

• Problems• No rainfall• 2/3 of families leave

The Farmers Frontier

• The Great American Desert • Western Prairie had think

sod, no trees. Thought to be un-farmable.

• Rich soil underneath• Sod-busting

– Oxen and heavy plow

• 1870s farmers stream onto Western Prairie

The Farmers Frontier

• 1870s- good farming• 1880’s- 6 year drought• Dry farming- to combat

conditions- hello dust bowl decades later

• Important innovations– Russian Wheat

– Barb wire

– Irrigation

Oklahoma

• Sooners- illegally jump start land grab

• Boomers- wait, do it legally

• Sooner state

Fading Frontier • The frontier is

considered to have closed in 1890.

• No longer a discernable frontier line.

• No longer “good” free land readily available.

• Lots of unsettled land, but largely undesirable.

• No longer line beyond which wilderness and no civilization.

Fading Frontier

• Frederick Jackson Turner “The Significance of the Frontier in American History”

• The west shaped our culture

• Rugged individualism • Safety valve is gone

The Farm Becomes A Factory

• After ACW- farming becomes more business like.

• Mechanization of Agriculture • Farmers must purchase new expensive

technology (Combine)• Small farmers are starting to die off (and join

industrial labor force

Un-happy farmers

• Grasshoppers in the prairie, boll weevil in the South

• Tariffs help industry, hurts farmers, have to sell product on unprotected world market, while buying expensive domestic goods

• Middle men make lots of money selling new technology

• Railroads charge expensive rates, if farmers complain RR let their crops spoil

• Farmers are disorganized in a political sense

Deflation Dooms the Debtor• Cash Crop Issues (wheat and grain)• Wheat in Russia, and Argentina flourish- grain prices dropped

dramatically in 1880’s and 90’s• 1855- Family borrows 1,000 dollars- pay it back with a 1,000

bushels of wheat (dollar a bushel)• 1890- wheat = 50cents a bushel, farmer than would have to pay

with 2,000 bushels • Farmers buy new technology (loans), which produces more goods

(drives down the price), making less money and driving them into debt

• America is feeding the world, while its farmers are slowly dying off

Farmers take a stand • The Grange (1867).

– Oliver Kelley the founder

• Goals– Farmers education

(social and agricultural)– Advocated regulation of

RR rates, grain storage fees.

– Farmers co-operatives • Got states to pass laws

regulating RR and grain elevators, but Supreme Court struck down these laws. (Granger Laws) (Wabash decision

Prelude to Populism• Farmers’ Alliance founded in Teas in late 1870s. • By 1890 more than a million members.• Problems

– targeted to land-owners, thus ignoring all the tenant farmers

– excluded blacks, half all southern farmers• Goals:

– nationalize RR, – abolish national banks, – institute a graduated income tax – government-owned warehouses where they could store

their crops until market prices rose while taking out loans against the assumed future value of their crops

• Eventually become the populist party

Coxey’s Army

• Panic of 1893- shows farmers and laborers that they are being oppressed

• Coxey’s Army– Public work programs

for unemployed

• Make it to DC

Pullman Strike of 1894• Eugene Debs- organizes

American Railway Union

• Pullman Place Car Co.- hurt by depression, cut wages by 1/3 but doesn’t adjust rent in Co. town

• American Federation of Labor- didn’t support strike- helps retain their “respectable” label

• Federal government sends in troops (strike interfered with mail service)

• Debs imprisoned for violating injunction – proof to laborers that government and business were in alliance

Election of 1986• Issue- whether to maintain

gold standard or inflate currency by monetizing silver

• Republicans– Civil War Vet William

McKinley – Supported by Marcus Hanna

(made fortune in iron)– Trickle Down theory – Hanna funds campaign – Favored hard money

policies( even though WM voted for silver while in congress

Election of 1986• Democrats • Can’t pick Grover Cleveland – Why • William Jennings Bryan – “Boy

Orator of the Platte”• Delivers cross of Gold Speech • Platform calls for unlimited minting

of silver at the ratio of 16 ounces for each ounce of gold.

• Many conservative democrats (Gold Bugs) bolt the party and support McKinley.

• Populists endorse Bryan

You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold!

Election of 1986• Republicans assumed tariff

would be the primary issue, but Bryan made it silver.

• He traveled tirelessly giving 600 speeches.

• His campaign like a religious crusade. – Silver became the

rallying cry.– Debtors and Farmers v.

eastern big-money interests.

– Gold standard a scapegoat.

Election of 1986

• Conservatives and business interests saw the free-coinage of silver as the road to economic ruin.

• Allowed Hanna to raise tons of money from big businesses

• Republicans had a 16-1 money advantage. • Hanna wages campaign of fear against Bryan.• Slogan “McKinley and a full dinner pail.” • McKinley campaigns from his porch• Employers scare employees

Election of 1896

Election of 1896

• In many ways demonstrates other elections few privileged vs under-privileged

• Demonstrates power of big business

• Last time political candidates appeal to farmers

William McKinley • McKinley was a cautions, temperate, conservative• Worked well with congress and with his own party• Did not advocate major reforms. (Big business still

rules)• Tariff rates back to 46.5%• Soon after the election, prosperity returned; natural

business cycle. Republicans took credit.• Inflation happened naturally.

– New gold discoveries and new processes for extracting gold from ore increase money supply

• Gold standard act 1900- paper currency redeemed freely in gold

• Money issue is over