Frontier and Factory

Readings: Boyer, Paul S. et al. The Enduring Vision: A History of the American People

Chapter 17     The Trans-Mississippi West
Chapter 18     The Rise of Industrial America

Hofstadter, Richard  The American Political Tradition and the men who made it

The Spoilsmen:  An Age of Cynicism

Discussion Questions:

1.  William Seward said that the Civil War was an “irrepressible conflict.”  Was this also true of the conflict between white America and the Plains Indians? How could the situation have been handled differently?

2.  What was the conflict between the farmers and the railroads?  Why did the early state and federal efforts to regulate railroads fail?

3.  Is Frederick Jackson Turner’s “frontier theses” correct? Do you see any evidence of it in the American Character today?

4.  Explain how the building of the nation's railroad network stimulated American industrialization and the growth of large corporations.

5.  Discuss government attempts to stop the growth of trusts and monopolies in the late nineteenth century. Why were these efforts ineffective?

6.  How would a conservative Social Darwinist view government’s role in terms of poverty and the exploitation of labor. How would the Social Darwinist justify such recommendations?  How would a Social Darwinist view the AP program?

Identifications:

John M. Chivington and the Sand Creek Massacre

Sitting Bull

George Armstrong Custer

Chief Joseph

Chief Dull Knife

Carlisle Indian School

Helen Hunt Jackson, A Century of Dishonor

Dawes Severalty Act, 1887

Wounded Knee

Pacific Railroad Act, 1862

Homestead Act, 1862

the Grange and the Granger Laws

Wabash v. Illinois, 1886

Interstate Commerce Act, 1887

Frederick Jackson Turner's “frontier thesis”

 

Jay Gould

Interstate Commerce Act

J. Pierpont Morgan

Andrew Carnegie

John D. Rockefeller and Standard Oil

Sherman Anti-Trust Act, 1890 

United States v. E. C. Knigbt Co.

Thomas A. Edison

National Labor Union 

Terence V. Powderly and the Knights of Labor 

Chinese Exclusion Act, 1882

Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor 

railroad strikes of 1877

Haymarket Square bombing, 1886

Homestead strike, 1892

Pullman strike, 1894

Eugene Debs

William Graham Sumner and conservative Social Darwinism

Lester Frank Ward

Henry George, Progress and Poverty

Edward Bellamy, Looking Backward