Chapter 18 - Big Business and Organized Labor
· I. The rise of big business
o A. Overview of factors propelling growth
§ 1. Natural resources
§ 2. New technology and mass production techniques
§ 3. Entrepreneurship
§ 4. Government policies
§ 5. Corruption
o B. Second Industrial Revolution
§ 1. Spurred by innovation and invention
§ a. Transportation and communication networks
§ b. Electricity
§ c. Application of scientific research to industry
· II. The railroads
o A. Growth of railroads
o B. The transcontinental railroads
§ 1. Pacific Railroads Act (1862) authorized transcontinental line on north-central route
§ a. Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads
§ 2. Labor
§ a. Union Pacific: Civil War veterans, formers slaves, Irish and German immigrants
§ b. Central Pacific: primarily Chinese
§ 3. First transcontinental railroad completed in Promontory, Utah, 1869
§ 4. Other transcontinental railroads
o C. Financing the railroads
§ 1. Role of the robber barons
§ a. Crédit Mobilier
§ b. Jay Gould
§ c. Cornelius Vanderbilt
· III. Manufacturing and inventions
o A. The growth of new industries and the transformation of old ones
o B. Technological advances and the impact on daily life
§ 1. Alexander Graham Bell and the telephone, 1876
§ 2. Thomas Alva Edison and the electric light, 1879
· IV. Entrepreneurs
o A. John D. Rockefeller
§ 1. Pennsylvania oil rush of 1859
§ 2. Rockefeller as oil refiner
§ 3. Growth of Standard Oil
§ 4. Rockefeller’s organization of Standard Oil
§ a. Standard Oil Trust
o B. Andrew Carnegie
§ 1. Background and early ventures
§ 2. Carnegie and steel
§ 3. Carnegie’s approach
§ 4. “The Gospel of Wealth“
§ 5. Philanthropy
o C. J. Pierpont Morgan
§ 1. Family background
§ 2. Morgan and investment banking
§ 3. Morgan and railroads
§ 4. Morgan and U.S. Steel
o D. Sears and Roebuck
§ 1. Problem of distribution solved by mail order
§ 2. Opens truly national markets
· V. The Working Class
o A. Social trends
§ 1. Growing disparities in the distribution of wealth
§ 2. Women, children, and immigrants enter the workforce
o B. Living and working conditions
§ 1. Living conditions
§ a. Crowded and filthy tenements
§ 2. Working conditions
§ a. Poor safety and health conditions in factories
§ b. Rise of impersonal, contractual relationships
o C. Child labor
§ 1. Dismal work conditions, meager wages
§ a. Appalachia mines
§ b. Southern and New England textile mills
§ 2. Few and largely ineffective child labor laws
· VI. Early worker protests
o A. Reasons for the slow growth of unions
§ 1. Property rights valued over labor rights
§ 2. Large labor supply
§ 3. Ethnic divisions among laborers
o B. The Molly Maguires
o C. The Great Railroad Strike of 1877
§ 1. Reduction of wages was immediate cause
§ 2. The strikes spread across the country
§ 3. Failure of the strikes
o D. The sand-lot incident
§ 1. Kearney and the Workingmen’s party of California push for Chinese exclusion act, 1882
o E. Anti-Chinese agitation
· VII. The rise of unions
o A. Unions in the 1850s and 1860s
o B. The National Labor Union
§ 1. The first federation of unions
§ 2. Leader’s death weakens NLU, which disbands by 1872
§ 3. Some achievements before disbanding
§ a. Influential in persuading Congress to pass eight-hour work day
§ b. Repeal of Contract Labor Act
· VIII. The Knights of Labor
o A. Founded in 1869 by Uriah S. Stephens
o B. Success under Terrence V. Powderly
§ 1. Growth in membership
o C. Decline of the Knights of Labor
§ 1. Anarchism
§ 2. The Haymarket affair
§ a. Riot in Haymarket Square
§ b. Trial and sentencing of anarchists
§ c. Effects on Knights of Labor
o D. Achievements of Knights of Labor
§ 1. Creation of the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics
§ 2. Foran Act of 1885
§ 3. Popularizing the idea of industrial unions
· IX. The American Federation of Labor
o A. Structure of the AFL
§ 1. Craft unions
§ 2. Contrast with Knights of Labor
o B. Samuel Gompers
§ 1. Concern for concrete economic gains
§ 2. Gompers’s leadership in the AFL
§ a. Contrast with Terrence Powderly
o C. Membership growth in the AFL
· X. Struggles and setbacks of the 1890s
o A. The Homestead steel strike of 1892
§ 1. Reasons for the strike
§ a. Worker layoffs, introduction of labor saving machinery
§ b. Homestead President Henry Clay Frick’s deliberate attempt to smash the Union
§ 2. Battle between strikers and Pinkerton detectives
§ 3. Strike failed, union dead at Homestead
o B. The Pullman strike of 1894
§ 1. Grievances
§ a. Workers forced to live in town of Pullman
§ b. Wages cut but not rents
§ 2. Workers turned to Eugene Debs and the American Railway Union
§ 3. Strike tied up most midwestern railroads and turned violent
§ 4. Federal intervention because Pullman carried the U.S. mail
§ 5. Debs jailed; union called off strike
o C. Mary “Mother Jones“ Harris
§ 1. Immigrant widow who became embraced labor movement in Chicago in late nineteenth century
§ 2. Fought for higher wages, shorter hours, safer workplaces, and child labor limits
§ 3. Organized and involved in several strikes and protests, arrested and imprisoned for her efforts
§ 4. Lost most strikes she participated in
§ 5. Still saw improvements in key issues of wage increases, working conditions, and child labor by her death in 1930s
· XI. Socialism, radicalism, and the unions
o A. Daniel De Leon and the Socialist Labor party
o B. Eugene Debs and the Social Democratic party
o C. The Socialist party of America
§ 1. Debs in the presidential elections of 1904 and 1912
§ 2. Successes of the party
§ a. Socialist mayors elected
§ b. Growing percentage of popular vote nationally
§ (1) 16.5 percent in 1912
§ 3. Decline of the party
§ a. Internal divisions over U.S. involvement in World War I
§ b. Defections to the Communist Party
o D. The Industrial Workers of the World
§ 1. Origins of the IWW: western mining and lumber camps
§ 2. Goals of the IWW
§ a. To include all workers, skilled and unskilled
§ b. To replace the state with one big union
§ 3. Decline of the IWW
§ a. Disputes within the group
§ b. Strategies of IWW leader William D. “Big Bill“ Haywood
§ (1) reached out to fringe elements of labor force to build movement
§ (2) resistant to compromising on revolutionary principals to reach labor agreements
§ c. IWW radicalism fueled hysterical opposition
§ (1) World War I destroys the group
§ (2) Leaders jailed or fled