HIST 2112 1st edition Lecture 11 Outline of Previous Lecture I Writing a paper Guidelines II Immigrants Outline of Current Lecture I The Rectangle of Righteousness Kansas II Agrarian America III Industrialism s Threats to Farmers IV Forming Alliances Unionized V The National Alliance s Plan the Ocala Demands 1890 and the Omaha Platform 1892 VI 1892 96 The Populist Party Current Lecture I II The Rectangle of Righteousness Kansas Kansas Nebraska Midwest South and other states were one of the hot beds for Populism The Populist was made up of farmers from the Midwest and south they were worried about industrialism They worried about big businesses banks monopolies and railroads The populist movement was the farmers They were the second biggest movement against industrialism They were from the rural area Extremely popular Populist Party merged out of this movement By the time it was all over 80 of Kansas politicians were a part of the Populist party Populist disappeared as quickly as it appeared It just flashed in the 1890s Agrarian America The farmer as an ideal person their role as a farmer Before industrialism America mostly rural o Most people are farmer o The farmer is where best of American values reside Jeffersonian Agrarianism farmers as idea l o Thomas Jefferson was the farmers president he was the most famous of farmer ideals These notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor s lecture GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes not as a substitute III Wrote a book and his most famous quote was Those who teal the soil are the public s most virtuous citizens o What we get from Jefferson on down is this thought of farmers being hero s o The image of the farmer starts to look shaky eventually o The farmers are anti capitalists or opposed to technology but they are scared that industrialism will accumulate all the power o They want a society where power is distributed evenly to the people they don t want the industry to take over o They want the government to be strong enough to protect the small business owners and farmers from the industrialists Industrialism s Threats to Farmers Financial Trouble debt etc o The late 1800s was particularly tough for the farmers o What hurt them was over production They produced too much food Because of technology and the soil was amazingly productive so the farmers produced a lot of food which caused the prices to fall The farmers were then barely able to cover the costs for growing the food which hurt them because they made no extra money Sometimes it was at the point where the farmers made less than what they spent to grow the crops Monopolies railroads and banks o The railroads had monopolies Where the farmers lived there was only one railroad in their area So the railroads would make them pay absorbent fees for the farmers to transport there food If they didn t pay the railroads ridiculous prices than there food would rot and there work would go to waste In the populist world no one likes the railroads o When you are in trouble you have to borrow money from the banks And they don t have to be nice to you it s a business deal The farmers can t break out of the debt because prices are so low for their food and then they go more in debt because they can t pay off previous loans Eventually they go in so much debt the bank would close on farmers and would take everything from them Often there was only one bank in town so the bank could be as vicious as they wanted Producerism o The only honest wealth is wealth that is gotten through honest toil o The farmers believed in earning money honestly which is one of the reasons they disliked the corporations Not only did the railroads and IV V banks almost own them and control them but they also made their money dishonestly Status Anxiety o Farmers are scared because they are no longer the ideal It is no longer the American dream to be a farmer It is scary because the farmers were the hero s for so long and now they are falling to the bottom o The farmers were so scared angry so they formed alliances Forming Alliances Unionized 1867 70 Patrons of Husbandry Also known as The Grange o They didn t do a whole lot 1880s National Farmers Alliance o Starts out in Texas and was really small o The reason they got so big so quickly was because they were mastery organizers They would send a speaker to towns to talk about the plight of the farmer o By the time it is all over this was the organization that created the Populist Party The democrats were a little afraid that they would lose their votes to the Populists o Links to the Knights of Labor The National Alliance s Plan the Ocala Demands 1890 and the Omaha Platform 1892 Public ownership of the railroads o The government should run the railroads and it should not be run by one single person that could screw over the working man Direct election of senators graduated income tax o You can vote for your own senator o People should be taxes according to their income No protective tariffs for industry o Government should not be able to do special favors for the industry and pass laws to help the industrialists The Subtreasury system o The subtreasury is a combination of a bank and a grain elevator o When farmers grow crops they store their crops in grain elevators until the railroads came by to pick them up and take them somewhere else The farmers would store crops in there grain elevators and keep them there until prices start to rise because of scarcity VI then they would release the crops from the grain elevator and they would make more money And then there are the banks that are attached The farmers would go to the banks and get a government loan that would help them until they release the crops to make money Free coinage of silver o The farmers are in debt o There is not a lot of physical money in the economy because at that time the American money was backed up They were on the gold standard Gold Standard Every amount of dollars had an equal amount of gold in the treasury That was an insurance to make sure money did not lose its value So there isn t that much gold out there so there isn t that much money out there So paying off debt was really hard because money was scarce Populists believed that money should be backed by silver instead because it would create inflation which would make it easier for farmers to pay there bills 1892 96 The Populist Party James B Weaver Union General runs for President 1896 William Jennings Bryan
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