APUSH Unit 6 ext

What does the Gilded Age refer to?

It was a time of corruption; gold covering rotting wood; coined by mark twain.

Industrial Revolution

A period of rapid growth in the use of machines in manufacturing and production rather than an agricultural economy

Key technologies of the Gilded Age

Railroads, Bessemer process, use of fossil fuels, telegraphs/telephones, factory lines

unskilled labor

work that requires no specialized skills, education, or training

Monopoly

Complete control of a product or business by one person or group

factory life in the mid-1800s

women, children often worked long hours 14 hours a day, for little pay in poor working conditions. No safety regulations. Lots of accidents and death

Titans of Industry

Positive name for wealthy business owners of this time. Says that they helped the country become strong, created jobs, made things cheaper, worked hard

Robber Barons

Refers to the industrialists or big business owners who gained huge profits by paying their employees extremely low wages. They also drove their competitors out of business by selling their products cheaper than it cost to produce it. Then when they controlled the market, they hiked prices high above original price.

Gospel of Wealth

This was a book written by Carnegie that described the responsibility of the rich to be philanthropists. Carnegie did not think well of people who died wealthy or who inherited their wealth

Social Darwinism

The belief that only the fittest survive in human political and economic struggle.

What is a strike?

Workers refuse to work to force owners to raise wages and improve working conditions

Homestead Strike

1892 steelworker strike near Pittsburgh against the Carnegie Steel Company. Ten workers were killed in a riot when mercenaries was brought in to force an end to the strike.

Turner's Frontier Thesis

argued that the American character was shaped by the existence of the frontier and the way Americans interacted and developed the frontier, he felt that the frontier encouraged individualism and democracy

Census of 1890

announced that the frontier region of the United States no longer existed and that the Census Bureau would no longer track the westward migration of the U.S. population.

Death of the Buffalo

Mass slaughter of Buffalo, was a huge hit to the Native populations who relied on them

Conservation Movement

A progressive reform movement focused on the preservation and sustainable management of the nation's natural resources.

Ghost Dance Movement

The last effort of Native Americans to resist US domination and drive whites from their ancestral lands, came through as a religious movement.

Assimilation

Trying to change Native Americans to act, think, dress, believe, and speak like White Americans

wasp

White Anglo-Saxon Protestants in the United states, are an ethnic group known for forming the dominant social class of powerful white Americans of British Protestant ancestry. Some WASPs trace their ancestry to the American colonial period.

New Immigrants

immigrants who had come to the US after the 1880s from southern and eastern europe

Why are people fleeing Europe in the late 1800s?

1. over-population

2. dictatorships

3. floods and famine

4. freedom (religion and government)

5. opportunity

Nativism

the policy of protecting the interests of native-born or established inhabitants against those of immigrants.

Jane Addams

the founder of Hull House, which provided English lessons for immigrants, daycares, and child care classes

Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882

law that suspended Chinese immigration into America. The ban was supposed to last 10 years, but it was expanded several times and was essentially in effect until WWII. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was the first significant law that restricted immigration into the United States of an ethnic working group. Extreme example of nativism of period

Laissez-faire

Idea that government should play as small a role as possible in economic affairs.

political machine

A party organization that recruits voter loyalty with tangible incentives and is characterized by a high degree of control over member activity

Political Bosses

powerful leaders who ran local politics in many cities, providing jobs and social services to immigrants in exchange for political support

Pendleton Act

reform measure that established the principle of federal employment on the basis of open, competitive exams and created the Civil Service Commission

Protective Tariff

A tax on imported goods that raises the price of imports so people will buy domestic goods

Treaty of Kanagawa

1854 treaty between Japan and the US. Japan agreed to open two ports to American ships

Munn vs. Illinois

(1877) Supreme Court ruled that stated States could regulate businesses clothed w/ a "public interest" including railroads. Went against "Granger laws" in which farmers wanted to fix max freight rates and warehouse charge against grain elevators.

Used the 14th amendment to prevent too much regulation of businesses

Crime of 1873

A term used by those critical of an 1873 law directing the U.S. Treasury to cease minting silver dollars, retire Civil War-era greenbacks, and replace them with notes backed by the gold standard from an expanded system of national banks.

Comstock Lode

Rich deposits of silver found in Nevada in 1859.

What does the Steel company do to cause conflict?

1. Reduce worker pay

2. Refuse to acknowledge the Union

3. Close the entire factory (fire everyone)

Standard Oil Company

Founded by John D. Rockefeller. Powerful Oil Monopoly