Chapter 17 Notes
Post War Greed
- How does the book explain Americans’ interest in wealth and materialistic things in the wake of the Civil War?
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- What is Laissez-Faire economics and how did it correspond with the business sensibilities of the day?
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- What is the Great Barbecue and who coined the term?
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- What is the thesis of Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859)?
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- What does the term Social Darwinism refer too?
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Congress Ascendant/Political Aftermath of War
- Based on who held office in the Presidency, the Senate and the House of Reps in the post-Reconstruction phase of American history, how does the interests of business grow and circumvent good government for the people?
______
- With regards to political parties, the South tended to vote ______, the Northeast voted ______, and the rest of the country ______.
- There were four questions in post Civil War Americathat politicians had to deal with.
- Describe “waving the bloody shirt” ______
- What was the issue of veterans’ pensions? ______
- What was the argument for maintaining the tariff? ______Whenever they discussed lowering the tariff to avoid overprotection what got in the way? ______
- What were greenbacks? ______
- Why was there a need for civil service reform and what problems did this cause? ______What is political patronage, what problems did it cause and why did the political leaders not want to give it up? ______
Blacks After Reconstruction
After 1877, the federal government did little to protect the rights of African-Americans
- Describe Hall v. DeCuir – ______
- Describe Civil Rights Cases (1883) – ______
- Describe Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) ______
- Where were Northerners when these types of decisions were made? ______
- Why was Booker T Washington called the “reasonable” champion of his race? ______
- Why did whites like/ and some blacks dislike the message of the Atlanta Compromise? ______
- Now that white could no longer enslave African-Americans, how did poor/middle class Southern whites maintain their dominance over blacks? ______
- How many lynchings per year occurred between 1890-1910? ______
The West After the Civil War
- How would describe places like San Francisco, Denver, San Antonio and Salt Lake City in the 1870s? ______
- In 1879, several African-Americans migrated West. How were they treated? ______
- What was the 1868 Burlingame Treaty and what did it do to the immigration numbers?______
- What were the 1877 San Francisco riots all about? How did California treat Chinese and what was the solution to the immigration “problem”? ______
The Plains Indians –Their Wars and Eventual Destruction
- By 1860, where did the Native American population reside in America? ______
- Describe what role the buffalo played in the culture of the Plains Indians - ______
- Describe what role the horse played in the culture of the Plains Indians – ______
As American civilization moved further west, the Native Americans became more of a problem to them. They made agreements with tribes, but both sides had difficulty respecting these agreements. As whites began to covet territory, treaties were broken and tensions rose.
- What was the concentration strategy? – ______
- During the Civil War what happened in the west between whites and Indians? ______
- What happened at Sand Creek in 1864? ______
- After the American government abandoned the concentration strategy, they attempted to force Indians onto reservations in South Dakota and Oklahoma. What was the Indian reaction? ______
- What caused whites to invade reservation land in 1874? ______
- What were the most important factors in subduing the Plains Indians, why? ______
- What was the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887? ______
- Why did the Dawes Severalty Act fail? ______
The Lure of Gold and Silver in the West
- Describe the experience of a prospector and boomtowns? ______
- What was the Comstock Lode? ______
- Who were the real money makers in the mining business? ______
Big Business and the Land Bonanza
- Why does the Homestead Act of 1862 (offered cheap 160 acre plots) fail to attract small farmers? ______
- How did the Timber and Stone Act contribute to big business in the west? ______
Western Railroads
The west was an untapped fountain of resources. The railroads made it possible to more efficiently access this territory. As a result, business interests venture to these territories and begin extracting the resources, sometimes recklessly.
- What was the problem with private investors buying land for western railroad development? ______
- How did the government assist railroads in financing railroads? What was the first? ______
- What was the Pacific Railway Act of 1862 – ______
- What railway lines connected the first transcontinental railroad in 1869 in Utah? ______
- What was the problem with using land grant money for this construction effort? ______
- Why was the Great Northern Railroad the only transcontinental railroad to survive the depression of 1890 without going bankrupt? ______
CattleKingdom– Ranching
- In post Civil War America, the cattle industry opened in the west. How did ranchers keep expenses low? ______
- What factors led to the rise of the cattle industry?
- ______
- ______
- If cattlemen wanted to sell in the cities, where they could make far more money, what did they have to do? ______
- Cowboys are born from this industry. How does the book describe them? Are they anything like the typical American western? ______
- What was the Desert land Act (1877) and what problems did it cause? ______
- What were cattlemen’s associations? – ______
- How did barbed wire fences cause problems? ______
- What unanticipated problems did barbed wire cause for cattle? ______
- Why was 1886 a tough year for cattlemen? ______