Responding to Big Business:

1. Responding to Big Business: Unions and the Populist Party

2. Workers Need Countervailing Power of Unions • Bargain as a large group with strike as a potential weapon; • Provide insurance and other benefits; • Organization of political power; lobbying and perhaps political party.

3. Unequal Match:Homestead Strike, 1892 • Homestead, PA: Large Carnegie Steel Plant • In 1892, Andrew Carnegie and William Frick Cut Wages. • Union (Amalgamated) Protested; Carnegie and Frick Locked Out Union. • Documentary Explains What Happened.

4. Homestead Revealed Inequality • Economic Power of the Capitalists (Plant Closures, Pinkerton Detectives) • State Militia Sided with Capitalists • Immigration Provided Plenty of Strikebreakers

5. One Response: American Federation of Labor • Samuel Gompers--Former Socialist • Central Leadership for Craft Unions • 1886: 50,000 Members; 1906: 1.6 Million Workers

6. Pragmatic Exclusion:“Pure and Simple Unionism” • Reformist; Accepted Industrial Capitalism • Craft Unionism: Skilled Workers; Craft Autonomy; Economic Goals • Exclusive: Anti-Immigrant • Exclusive: Accepted Segregation • Exclusive: Against Working Women

7. The Rise and Fall of the Populist Party Farmers in the Age of Big Business

8. Some Preliminary Definitions • A populist: Somebody who appeals directly to the people. • Populist Party: Specific political party concentrated in the Plains States and the South in the 1890s.

9. Problems Facing Farmers • Low Prices for Output, High Interest Rates • Railroads (Rates 4 Times Higher than Eastern Manufacturers) • Farmers under attack (“Hayseed” Stereotype)

10. Primary Populist Solution: Monetary Reform & Inflation

11. Why Farmer Smith Supported Free Silver and Silver Standard • Imagine Farmer Smith Produces Grain Worth $2,000 Per Year and Has Mortgage of $2,000. • Silver Doubles Money Supply and Prices Rise 100 percent. • Farmer Smith Now Makes $4,000 per year. PROSPERITY!!!

12. Wizard of Oz as Populist Allegory • Frank Baum, 1900

13. Was Silver and Inflation a Viable Long-term Solution? • A. Yes • B. No

14. Wizard of Oz as Populist Allegory • Frank Baum, 1900 • Symbolism of Characters

15. What Was the Color of Dorothy’s Shoes? • A. Ruby Red • B. Silver • C. Gold

16. Wizard of Oz as Populist Allegory • Frank Baum, 1900 • Symbolism of Characters • Dorothy’s Shoes

17. Wizard of Oz as Populist Allegory • Frank Baum, 1900 • Symbolism of Characters • Dorothy’s Shoes X

18. Wizard of Oz as Populist Allegory • Frank Baum, 1900 • Symbolism of Characters • Dorothy’s Shoes

19. Wizard of Oz as Populist Allegory • Frank Baum, 1900 • Symbolism of Characters • Dorothy’s Shoes • Wizard and End of Story

20. Back to Reality: Formation of the Populist Party • Early Forerunners: The Grange and the Farmers Alliance.

21. Back to Reality: Formation of the Populist Party • Early Forerunners: The Grange and the Farmers Alliance. • The People’s Party (1890).

22. Back to Reality: Formation of the Populist Party • Early Forerunners: The Grange and the Farmers Alliance. • The People’s Party (1890). • Presidential Election of 1892: 9 percent of the popular vote.

23. Pivotal Election of 1896 • William Jennings Bryan, Cross of Gold Speech • Fusion Ticket with Demos, Populists

24. Pivotal Election of 1896 • William Jennings Bryan, Cross of Gold Speech • Fusion Ticket with Demos, Populists • William McKinley, Republicans

25. Why Bryan Lost in 1896 • Little Appeal to Many Industrial Workers • Little Appeal to Middle Class