Populism and Jim Crow

Populism

the political doctrine that supports the rights and powers of the common people in their struggle with the privileged elite

Greenbacks

Name for Union paper money not backed by gold or silver. Value would fluctuate depending on status of the war (plural)

inflation

a general increase in prices and fall in the purchasing value of money.

deflation

a decrease in the general level of prices

Gold Standard

A monetary system in which paper money and coins are equal to the value of a certain amount of gold

"Silverites" vs "Gold Bugs"

"Silverites" wanted to increase the coinage of silver and thus the money supply, which would lead to inflation and help farmers pay debts. "Gold Bugs" wanted to hold to the Gold Standard, preventing inflation and possibly even leading to deflation as the population increased.

Grange

an association formed by farmers in the last 1800s to make life better for farmers by sharing information about crops, prices, and supplies

cooperatives

a farm, business, or other organization that is owned and run jointly by its members, who share the profits or benefits.

Farmers' Alliance

A Farmers' organization founded in late 1870s; worked for lower railroad freight rates, lower interest rates, and a change in the governments tight money policy

People's Party (Populists)

Started as Farmer's Alliance, farmers came together and became organized, translated into Populists. Wanted to unite farmers of south/west/poor blacks and whites and industrial/factory workers

Graduated Income Tax

a method of taxation that taxes people at different rates depending on income

Panic of 1893

Serious economic depression beginning in 1893. Began due to rail road companies over-extending themselves, causing bank failures. Was the worst economic collapse in the history of the country until that point, and, some say, as bad as the Great Depression of the 1930s.

William Jennings Bryan

United States lawyer and politician who advocated free silver and prosecuted John Scopes (1925) for teaching evolution in a Tennessee high school (1860-1925)

Segregation

Separation of people based on racial, ethnic, or other differences

Miscegenation

a demeaning historical term for interracial marriage

sharecroppers

people who rent a plot of land from another person, and farm it in exchange for a share of the crop

Exodusters

African Americans who moved from post reconstruction South to Kansas.

Colored Farmers' Alliance

More than 1 million southern black farmers organized and shared complaints with poor white farmers. By 1890 membership numbered more than 250,000. The history of racial division in the South, made it hard for white and black farmers to work together in the same org.

Disenfranchise

deprive of voting rights

white primary

the practice of keeping blacks from voting in the southern states' primaries through arbitrary use of registration requirements and intimidation

Poll Tax

A tax of a fixed amount per person and payable as a requirement for the right to vote

Grandfather Clause

A clause in registration laws allowing people who do not meet registration requirements to vote if they or their ancestors had voted before 1867.

Literacy Test

A test administered as a precondition for voting, often used to prevent African Americans from exercising their right to vote.

Jim Crow Laws

Limited rights of blacks. Literacy tests, grandfather clauses and poll taxes limited black voting rights

Plessy v. Ferguson

a 1896 Supreme Court decision which legalized state ordered segregation so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal

lynching

putting a person to death by mob action without due process of law

Booker T. Washington

Prominent black American, born into slavery, who believed that racism would end once blacks acquired useful labor skills and proved their economic value to society, was head of the Tuskegee Institute in 1881. His book "Up from Slavery."

W.E.B. DuBois

1st black to earn Ph.D. from Harvard, encouraged blacks to resist systems of segregation and discrimination, helped create NAACP in 1910

Atlanta Compromise

Argument put forward by Booker T. Washington that African-Americans should not focus on civil rights or social equality but concentrate on economic self-improvement.

The Great Migration

movement of over 300,000 African American from the rural south into Northern cities between 1914 and 1920