5.10

Essential Questions:

  • Why did the Republicans unravel in the 1870s?

  • How was reconstruction rolled back?

Identification/Key Terms:

The Republican Economic Problem (482)

  • During war, Congress used federal pwr

    • transcontinental railproject,

    • raised protective tariff - gave nonpaying U.S. manufacturers advantage

The New Union and the World (483)

  • After war, Strategies of trade rather then direct conquest emerged

  • coasts linked by rail → americans looked across pacific for trade w/ Asia

  • Union victory → increased U.S. eco influence in Latin America

    • William seward (sec of state) beleived commerce with Asia was key to prosperity

      • forcibly reopen trade (closed by Japan) & purchase dnaval sites in Pacific & Carribean & annexation of hawaii

      • 1868 Burlingame Treaty w/ China - guarnteed rights of U.S. missionaries in China & set official terms for Chinese laborer emigration

      • negotiated purchase of Alaska from Russia

Integrating the National Economy (484)

  • W of Mississippi - railroads opened vast regions for farming, trade, & tourism

    • construction promoted by private companies, but fed gov provided essential loans

    • transformed American capitalism, could raise private captial in large amoutns

      • state legis - allowed buisnesses to become coorporations by applying for state charter → freer td as they pleased

  • Tariffs and the Economic Growth (484)

    • protective tarriffs - helped build textile & steel industries,

      • erased post-civil war debt & generated surplus

    • Reconstruction faltered → Demos argued that tariffs taxed consumers by denying acess to low cost goods, & made them pay subsidies to U.S. manufacturers

    • repubs argued tariffs created jobs, blocked foreign comp, & safuegaurded U.S. from poverty

      • in all, created rise of private corporations & trusts (monopoly like pwr) led to polit issues

  • The Role of Courts - 467 (486)

    • Mun vs Illinois 1877 - S.C. ruled states could regulate key buisnesses that were “clothed in public interest”

      • feared tm state & local regulations wld fragment nat marketplace → 14th amendment to shield corps from excessive regulation

    • after U.S. Mexico war - land remained in the hand of farmers & ranchers like peónes - under agreements w/ landowners granted land frm spanish crown

      • Anglos demanded mexican farmers to leave ranches

    • land titles complex - bwt 1891 & 1904, court invalidated most traditional land claims' → thousands of mexicans displaced

  • Silver and Gold - 469 (488)

    • 1870s & 1880s - U.S. held gold standard

    • Before - used silver & gold, but beleived discovery of more silver wld hurt ratio

      • “crime of 1873” - congress chose gold

      • gold standard → limited the nation’s money supply to level of available gold

        • also encouraged Euro investors w/ same standard

Incorporating the West. . . 469 (488)

  • Homestead Act (1862) - gave 160 acres of fed land to anyone who occupied & improved the prop'

    • repubs hoped wld build the interior W, inhabited by indians

  • Land grant colleges - congress created fed Dep of Agriculture

    • w/ Morill Act, 140 mil fed acres that states cld sell to raise money for pub universities → boraden educational oppurtunities

  • Well financed corps reaped W mine profis form indiv prospecter