Chapter 1

A Time of Great Change:
Immigration,
Industrialization,
and Urbanization
(1865–1914)

The Big Question
What impact did immigration,
industrialization, and
urbanization have on America in
the late 1800s and early 1900s?

The Transformation
The United States saw expansive
economic growth and dynamic
social change in the decades
following the American Civil War.
In the half century from the end of
that war in 1865 to the beginning
of the First World War in 1914,
the nation was transformed by
immigration, industrialization,
and urbanization.
Vocabulary
immigration, n. the act of coming to live
permanently in a new country
industrialization, n. a shift to the
widespread use of machines and
factories to produce goods
urbanization, n. the formation and
growth of cities

Millions of immigrants from other countries were
drawn to America by the promise of a new life.

2

Factories, mines, and mills grew in importance.
Waves of new immigrants arrived on America’s
shores. Cities grew bigger. Historians call this time
period the Second Industrial Revolution. From
1865 to 1914, some eleven million Americans
moved from rural farming communities into the
towns and cities that housed growing numbers of
factories. In these same years, twenty-five million
new immigrants, most from Europe, were drawn
by the promise of finding work in the expanding
American economy. Most often, the new arrivals
settled in major cities, especially those in the
Northeast and Midwest, such as New York, Boston,
Philadelphia, Chicago, Cleveland, and Detroit.
Some newly arrived immigrants moved into the
countryside to take up farming and other work.
Many of these new immigrants saw America as a
“land of opportunity,” especially in comparison
to the limited opportunities available to them in
their home countries. There were many stories
of success. At times, however, immigrants had to
endure a form of discrimination against them by
Americans. That discrimination is called nativism.

Vocabulary
economy, n. the way a country manages its money
and resources to produce, buy, and sell goods and
services
discrimination, n. unfair treatment of a person or
group because of beliefs about that group of people

Think Twice
Why were these events referred to as the
Second Industrial Revolution?

3

Melting Pot

its debut, first in Washington, D.C., and

Irish and German Immigration in
the 1900s

then in New York City. The play’s title

Immigrants coming to America were

In 1908, a play by the playwright Israel
Zangwill titled The Melting Pot made

popularized a metaphor about American

sometimes “pushed” to leave their home

immigration: America was a “melting

country because of poverty, religious

pot.” But, some people asked, what

persecution, or political unrest. They were

does calling the United States a melting

also “pulled” to America by the promise of

pot actually mean? Is the “melting pot”

economic opportunity, religious freedom,

one in which new immigrants’ cultures

and political democracy. In the years

are melted—absorbed—by America’s

from the mid-1800s to the early 1900s, as

traditional cultures? Or is the image of

today, there were push and pull factors

a melting pot meant to call forth ideas

in immigration. Many newly arrived

of immigrant and American cultures

immigrants found America to be a land

blending together, with each culture,

of great opportunity, even as they had

in some ways, melting into and taking

to endure hardships. Some Americans

on characteristics of the others? Some

welcomed the new arrivals, but other

scholars think that “salad bowl” or

Americans were anti-immigrant; they

“mosaic” is a more accurate metaphor.

were not happy with the arrival of so

The vegetables in the salad or the pieces

many foreigners.

of tile in a mosaic each retain their own

Think Twice

character.

What home-grown reasons drove
immigration to the United States of
America?

Think Twice
What metaphor would you use
to describe America in relation to
immigration, not only in terms of its past,
but today as well?

One example of being pushed to leave a
country occurred in Ireland. For several
years, beginning in 1845, disaster struck
Ireland when a plant disease known as
potato blight wiped out nearly the entire
potato crop. Starvation was everywhere.

4

Hungry and desperate Irish people gathered together at the gates of workhouses.

“There will be nothing for us but to lie

practice of exporting food from Ireland to

down and die,” said one poor woman.

England.)

One visitor to a small Irish town in 1847

A million people perished from starvation

wrote about what he saw there:

or from diseases related to malnutrition,

“Out of a population of 240, I found

and more than a million more left Ireland

thirteen already dead from want. The

and immigrated to America. Many newly

survivors were like walking skeletons—

arrived Irish settled in the Northeast,

the men gaunt and haggard, stamped

especially in Boston and New York City.

with the livid mark of hunger—the

Others found work on railroads and

children crying with pain—the women

in factories in the growing industrial

in some of the cabins too weak to stand.”

economy in cities such as Albany, Buffalo,

(Ireland was under the political control of

Cleveland, and Chicago.

Britain at the time, but the British did not

Vocabulary

reach out and send food to the starving

malnutrition, n. a state of poor health
due to not having enough healthy food

Irish people. Instead, they continued the

5

In the decade after 1845, more than

who were seeking to escape poverty

a million Germans immigrated to the

and religious persecution in Europe.

United States. Many German immigrants

(In Europe, Jewish people were often

were farmers and laborers in search

required to live in cramped areas called

of greater economic opportunity and

ghettos. Some ghettos were fenced-in

better jobs. They settled on farms across

streets in a city called a Judengasse. In

the Midwest and also in cities, including

some places, Jewish people were only

Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and St. Louis.

allowed to travel outside the ghetto into

Other Germans fled to the United States

other parts of a city at specific times or on

after the Revolutions of 1848 failed to

New Immigration, 1870–1920

specific days.)

bring greater democracy to Europe.

ARCTIC
OCEAN

ARCTIC OCEAN

Among these new immigrants were

Sweden
Norway
Denmark

Russian
Empire

lawyers, doctors, and skilled artisans.

Netherlands
Canada

Great Britain

Poland

Ireland
China

Spain

United
States

Japan

Mexico

“New Immigrants”: Southern and
Eastern European Immigration

Russian
Empire

Portugal

France
Italy

AustriaHungary

Germany

ATLANTIC
OCEAN

Greece

AFRICA

PACIFIC
OCEAN
SOUTH
AMERICA
AUSTRALIA

N
W

0

4,000 miles

E
S

Between 1880 and 1920, Europeans from

New immigration, 1870–1920

southern and eastern Europe began to

The story of American immigration is

arrive in large numbers. Up to this time

a story of tensions between ideals and

in American history, there had not been

realities.

many immigrants from these regions

INDIAN
OCEAN

The immigrants who came to the United

of Europe. But beginning around 1880,

States from the mid-1880s to the early

immigrants from Italy, Russia, Austria-

1900s included some professionals and

Hungary, and elsewhere poured into the

skilled workers, such as doctors, lawyers,

United States.

carpenters, stonecutters, tailors, and

Many of these immigrants, Italians and

printers. But a great many immigrants

Poles among them, were Catholic in

arrived poor and with limited skills.

their religious faith. They were joined in

Without skills, they had nothing to sell but

this wave of immigration by two million

their muscle power and their time. They

Jewish men, women, and children

took whatever work they could get, often

6

at low pay. Immigrant women found
work as maids, cooks, housekeepers, or
washer women. Immigrant men found
work sweeping streets, hauling trash,
digging ditches, or selling food from carts
as street vendors. In cities, immigrant
families—women, men, and children
alike—sometimes worked together in
their apartments, sewing garments for
low pay. In or near towns and cities in
the Northeast and Midwest, immigrants
found work in the factories, mines,
and mills of America’s rapidly growing

Even after that movement dissolved,
the anti-immigrant sentiment called
nativism continued. Nativist Americans
were unhappy about immigration. They
were angry that so many foreigners from
so many countries, speaking so many
languages and with different religious
beliefs from their own, were moving
to America. Nativists believed the new
immigrants were hurting native-born
Americans by taking their jobs or lowering
their wages.

industrial economy.

Find Out the Facts

In the 1840s and 1850s, there formed an
anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic movement
known as the “Know Nothing” movement.

How did the “Know Nothing”
movement get its name?

Immigrant families often worked long hours in their homes to earn enough to survive.

7

The issue of religion was also important.

were able to elect people of Irish heritage

Beginning in colonial times, most

to the city council and the mayor’s office.

Americans were Protestants in their

Soon, Boston and New York were hiring

religious faith. But many of the new

many Irish police officers, firefighters, and

arrivals—including many Irish, Italian,

civil servants.

Slavic, and German immigrants—were

Think Twice

Catholics. Catholics had different ways of

How might having political power
change an immigrant group’s experience?

practicing their Christian faith than did
Protestant Americans. Protestants were
wary of Catholics.
Religious tensions in the late 1800s
sometimes arose in public schools. At this

A Mighty Woman with a Torch

time in America, students were required

In the late 1800s, millions of immigrants

to read passages from the Bible during

arrived aboard ships in New York Harbor.

school. But Catholics and Protestants

There, they were processed through

used different translations of the Bible.

Castle Garden, at the southern tip of

Catholics were unhappy that their children Manhattan, and, after 1892, through
had to read a Protestant translation of
Ellis Island. In New York Harbor, in 1886,
the Bible at school. So Catholics founded

the Statue of Liberty—a gift from the

separate Catholic schools in which

people of France to the people of the

children read from the Catholic translation

United States—was installed on Liberty

of the Bible and also learned about their

Island. The poet Emma Lazarus wrote a

Catholic faith.

poem celebrating the new statue. In her

Although some immigrants had bad

poem, Lazarus calls the Statue of Liberty

experiences, immigrants also found

the “Mother of Exiles.” The statue is, she

Americans who welcomed and helped

writes, “a mighty woman” who holds high

them. Many also found churches and

the torch of freedom, welcoming in the

synagogues that offered charity and

new immigrants. The Statue of Liberty is

assistance. And as their numbers grew,

a symbol of this nation’s freedom, hope,

immigrants gained political power. In

and opportunity, beckoning struggling

Boston and in New York, for example, as

peoples around the world to America’s

the number of Irish immigrants grew, they shores. What people in foreign lands

8

consider their “wretched refuse,” the
United States welcomes. The final lines of

The Chinese Exclusion Act

her poem read:
Give me your tired, your poor,

Chinese immigrants settling in the United

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

States encountered their own version

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

of prejudice against immigrants. By

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

1880, more than one hundred thousand

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

Chinese people lived in the United States.
Nearly all of them lived on the West
Coast. They found work laying railway
tracks for the nation’s expanding western
railroads or working in factories and gold
fields. Chinese immigrants were different
from most native-born Americans.
They often dressed differently, the men
sometimes wore long pigtails, and they
had different religious practices than
native-born Americans. These immigrants
encountered prejudice and even violence.
In fact, prejudice against Chinese people
was so fierce that in 1882, the United
States Congress passed the Chinese
Exclusion Act, a law that banned further
Chinese immigration.

European immigrants passing the Statue of Liberty in
New York Harbor, 1892

Find Out the Facts
Find out more about the
Chinese Exclusion Act and what
it actually said.

Writers’ Corner
Imagine you are an immigrant on a
crowded ship as it sails into New York
Harbor. You catch your first glimpse of
the Statue of Liberty and also the city
of New York in the distance. Write
a descriptive paragraph about
what you see and how you feel.

9

Black Americans Move North
Between 1865 and 1920, many thousands
of Black Americans moved northward.
Most Black Americans had lived in the
South during slavery. In the decades
after slavery’s end in 1865, many decided
to move. In the South, segregation and
race prejudice continued to exclude
Black Americans from full citizenship and
opportunity. Between 1879 and 1880,
about sixty thousand Black Americans

Between 1865 and 1920, many Black Americans moved
from the South to the North in search of jobs and
opportunities.

moved to Kansas, where they hoped to
find better jobs and better schools than in

Political Machinery and Chicanery

the South.
During the First World War (1914–1918),
many Black Americans moved to
Northern cities such as Detroit, Chicago,
Pittsburgh, and New York to work in
wartime industries, helping to produce
the equipment, clothing, and weapons
the United States needed to fight the
war. In Northern cities, Black Americans
could find better-paying jobs and
opportunities that were lacking in the
South, though, to be sure, they continued
to experience prejudice even in the North.
Some Northern cities became centers of
Black American arts and culture. In the
1920s, Harlem, a section of New York City,
became a vibrant center of Black culture
and the cultural movement that came to
be known as the Harlem Renaissance.

A “political machine” is a political
organization in which people work
together under the leadership of one
person or a small group of people. The
word machine is used because a machine
has many parts that must work together.
In a political machine, each person has a
job to do, like gears in a machine. When
everything runs smoothly, political goals
can be accomplished. But sometimes
political machines can be dishonest
because the people who are part of those
political machines are corrupt.
One of the most famously corrupt political
machines in American history was that of
Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall. William
Marcy Tweed, known as Boss Tweed, was
a powerful politician in the late 1800s in

10

New York City, and he was one of the
leaders of the Tammany Hall political
machine. Boss Tweed and his men stole
millions of dollars from New York City’s
government, and they bribed people to
help them do it. They used all sorts of
tricks and lies. But finally, Boss Tweed
and the men who worked with him were
caught. Tweed was put in jail. He died in
the Ludlow Street Jail in New York City in
1878, at the age of fifty-five.

Americans worked in non-agricultural

Political machines can also work to

of economy and government “political

achieve positive things. Some historians

economy,” and it was America’s political

even point to ways in which Boss Tweed

economy that made it the wealthiest

and Tammany Hall helped the poor

country in the world—as it still is today.

and aided business
development. But
whatever good Boss
Tweed’s ring may have
done, his name remains
synonymous with
political corruption.

jobs than in agricultural ones. By the
1910s, American industry was producing a
third of the world’s manufactured goods.
That last sentence is something to think
about. The United States had become the
richest country in the world! American
commercial society, in combination with
the country’s representative democracy,
had given rise to astonishing economic
growth. Scholars call the combination

How exactly did this

Vocabulary
synonymous
(/sih*na*nuh*muss/), adj. alike in
meaning, like a synonym
political economy, n. the
combination or interaction of
economy and government

and mills grew rapidly. By 1880, more

The increasing number
of factories gave rise to
a vast expansion in the
amount and variety of
goods produced.

Think Twice

Rapid Growth: The Second
Industrial Revolution
Before the Civil War, most Americans
were farmers. In the early 1800s, there
were some factories, mostly cloth-making
factories in New England. However, after
1865, the number of factories, mines,

happen?

Do you think such rapid growth could
have happened without millions of
immigrants working in America?

Machines did all sorts of work. Some
machines spun thread and wove cloth.
Sewing machines stitched pieces of cloth
into shirts, pants, and dresses. Other
machines made pins, needles, and nails.

11

Machines were used to make typewriters

one person undertaking each step in

for homes and offices and mechanical

the process. As machine production

harvesters to help farmers in their fields.

output increased, labor costs per unit fell.

The telephone was invented in 1876 and

Industrialization made possible an ever-

the automobile in 1886. Soon, factories

increasing abundance of goods at lower

were producing phones and motor

prices.

vehicles of all sorts. Furthermore, in 1882,
the first electricity-generating power
station was built by Thomas Edison in
lower Manhattan. Within several years,
with Nikola Tesla’s alternating-current
power plants, electricity and electric
motors were replacing steam-powered
factories.
Innovation, engineering, and ingenuity
were transforming the production of
all sorts of things. Machines increased
output and lowered labor costs for each
unit of production. Where once it took
an individual worker a day to make one
pair of shoes, machines and assemblyline production streamlined the process.
In the newly emergent machine-assisted
production process, a worker might sit
for hours at a leather-stitching machine
stitching leather soles to “uppers.”
Another worker would focus on putting
holes and grommets where the shoes

Many women at this time were employed in garment
factories. Their income greatly helped their families.

would be laced. Yet another might work

Think Twice

at nailing the heels to the soles. In this

Can you think of recent advances in
technology that are having a similar
impact on the workplace and the
workforce?

way, many more shoes could be produced
in a day than had been produced by

12

Gilded Age
In 1873, Mark Twain coauthored a novel
titled The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today.
Historians like the term “Gilded Age,”
and use it to refer to the time period
from 1870 to 1890 (some historians
would say 1877 to 1895). When you
“gild” something, you cover something
ordinary, such as wood or plaster, with a
very thin layer of gold. By calling these
years the Gilded Age, historians are
suggesting that while a few Americans
lived bright lives of riches and gold, there
were many who experienced poverty
and suffering. The famous historian
Eric Foner points out that by 1890, the
richest one percent of Americans owned
more wealth than the other ninety-nine
percent.

Find Out the Facts
Who was Mark Twain, and
what is he most known for?

The Economy: Commercial Society
The rise of the industrial economy points

Each of these terms stresses a slightly
different aspect of the American
economic system. Adam Smith’s Wealth of
Nations (1776) outlines how the economy
in much of the world, including the United
States, works. In his book, Smith describes
how commercial society functions (he
never uses the word capitalism—that
word became more common in the late
1800s). He writes about how an economy
based on self-interest can lead individuals
to see that it is to each person’s benefit
to cooperate with others. Each of us,
Smith says, wants good economic lives
for ourselves and those we love. We are
motivated by our own wish to make
money and use that money to pay for, or
buy, the things we need and want. We
need food and a place to live, and we
come to recognize that if we cooperate
with others, we can all benefit. That’s
because in buying the things we need
from others, we allow them to meet
their own needs. Smith’s description
of commercial society explains how,
through ingenuity, innovation, and hard
work in a largely unregulated economic
market, a nation—and the people in

directly to how the American economy

Vocabulary

works. The American economy is referred

capitalism, n. an economic system in
which resources and businesses are
privately owned and prices are not
controlled by the government

to by different terms: a market economy,
a competitive market economy, a free
market economy, commercial society,
and capitalism.

13

an advantage to sell its goods. Employers
who wanted their business to succeed
pushed their workers to work long hours.
Factory managers enforced strict work
hours, sped up the pace of work, and kept
the wages of their workers low so that the
products cost less to produce. Then these
products could be priced competitively
against the products from other factories.

it—can achieve astonishing economic
successes. (Some people criticize the
commercial society Smith describes. Some
thinkers, the socialist Karl Marx among
them, have offered alternative approaches
to structuring a nation’s economy and
society. Of course, theory is one thing, and
practice is another.)

Think Twice
What do you think the author means
by “theory is one thing, and practice is
another”?

Factory Conditions
Mass production by machines made goods
less expensive and more readily available
than ever before. In the days before the
rise of the Industrial Revolution, artisans
handcrafted each item—shoes, clothes,
nails, and the like—from beginning to end.
But the new machines of the Industrial
Revolution often divided the process
into many small, repetitive tasks. So an
individual worker was assigned to do only
a single task over and over. These new
machines and methods greatly increased
the output of goods. But work in a factory
could be repetitive and exhausting.
What’s more, factory owners were often in
competition with each other. If one factory
produced a product that was made in
many other factories, that factory needed

A sweatshop is a factory or a workshop,
especially in the clothes-making industry,
in which workers are employed at very
low wages for long hours. Sweatshops
in the 1890s and 1900s were sometimes
located in crowded apartments—the
very apartments in which families lived.
In 1893, one observer, Helen Moore,
wrote about the “long panorama of heartrending sights” she observed among the
immigrant poor working in sweatshops
on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. She saw
there Irish, Italians, Germans, Poles, and
Russian Jews. “Every window,” she wrote,
“opens into a room crowded with . . . dullfaced men and women sewing upon heavy
woolen coats and trousers. They pant for
air, the perspiration that drops from their
foreheads is like life-blood, but they toil on
steadily, wearily.” Outside, on the street,
there was “fermenting [rotting] garbage in
the gutter.” Life for these immigrants was
especially hard—though often, their lives
back in Europe had been even harder.

14

Child Labor
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, more
than two million children were sent to
work in factories, mines, and mills in the
United States. Earlier, most Americans
made their living by farming, and many
children worked alongside their parents.
Although farmwork was hard and farming
chores had to be carried out in all kinds
of weather, children saw daylight,
worked outside, and could experience
the passing seasons. A child working in
a textile factory might work from sunup
to sundown, standing by a noisy loom,
helping make cloth for shirts and dresses.
A child’s job might be to fix a thread that
had broken as the machine was in motion
or to collect the fabric and put it into bins.
In underground coal mines, men used
pickaxes to break coal and rock from the
walls of the mine. Child workers picked
small bits of coal from among the rocks,
or they carried bags of coal and dumped
them into coal cars.

In coal mines, the air was often thick with
coal dust, and breathing in the coal dust
meant that workers’ lungs would become
congested with it. They would spit out
black gobs trying to clear their lungs, but
it was little use. The coal dust caused an
illness called black lung, which often led
to cancer. Conditions in factories and
mines were different and more dangerous
than working out-of-doors on farms or
inside a home.

Small boys in factories climbed onto spinning frames to
mend broken threads and replace empty bobbins.

Find Out the Facts
Research what life was like for
children working in factories,
sweatshops, or mines during this time in
American history.

The conditions in mines and mills could
be bad for workers’ health. The air in
textile mills was polluted by tiny bits of
fiber from cloth that got into workers’
lungs. Over the years, breathing the fibers
could cause a disease called brown lung.

Writers’ Corner
Use your research to write about a day in
the life of a child working in a factory, mill,
or mine. Either imagine you are that child
and describe your day, or imagine you
are a journalist reporting on what
you have discovered.

15

In this time of industrial change,
Americans were trying to figure out
what rules, laws, and public policies
their government should make. Most
laws and public policies addressed
issues in an agrarian America, not in an
industrial country. One of the big battles
in American politics in the period from
1865 to 1914, and one that remains a
political issue to this day, was this: When

One of the political disagreements that

should the government make laws,

go to school, and to pursue their dreams.

rules, or policies about a workplace?
One issue people considered was if
there should be a maximum number of
hours a person can work in a day. If so,
how many hours should we the people,
through our elected representatives, say
should be the maximum—twelve, ten,
eight? In addition, people thought about
working conditions. Should the state and
federal government make laws (which,
remember, are rules we agree to follow
as citizens) to regulate cleanliness or the
sorts of safety equipment there should be
in a workplace?

people had into the early 1900s was
whether or not the federal government or
state governments should be allowed to
make laws regulating child labor. Today,
of course, children may not, according
to the law, work in industry. Instead,
children are required by law to attend
school. Today, we believe that children
should have the opportunity to learn, to
But imagine if you had to go to work for
twelve hours a day in a mine
or factory!
In 1916, Congress passed a law to
restrict child labor. The law was called
the Keating-Owen Child Labor Act. The
American people had their representatives
pass a law to try to stop child labor. But
just two years later, in 1918, in a legal
case called Hammer v. Dagenhart, the U.S.
Supreme Court struck down the KeatingOwen Child Labor Act as unconstitutional.
That meant that it remained legal to put
children to work in factories. Several

Vocabulary

years later, the Supreme Court changed

public policy, n. a set of
government steps for how
something is done
agrarian (/uh*grehr*ee*uhn/), adj.
relating to farming or agriculture

its mind. The high court upheld the Fair
Labor Standards Act of 1938, which makes
child labor illegal.
Not all nine Supreme Court justices in the
1918 case thought that child labor was
okay. One Supreme Court justice, a man

16

named Oliver Wendell Holmes, disagreed

Think Twice

with his colleagues. In a dissenting

Do you think unskilled workers
deserve the same rights and legal
protections as skilled workers?

opinion in Hammer, Holmes wisely
wrote, “If there is any matter upon which
civilized countries have agreed . . . it is the
evil of . . . child labor.”

The Importance of Unions
When workers join together to protect
their interests, they form what is called
a union. There are different kinds of
unions. Skilled workers’ unions are

But the same was not true for skilled
workers. In the late 1800s and early
1900s, skilled workers such as carpenters,
bricklayers, steam pipe fitters, and
electricians were in demand. Unlike
unskilled workers, skilled workers formed
unions and found that they could bargain
with employers for higher wages, shorter
hours of work, and better working
conditions.

their employers for better pay or safer

In 1886, a group of trade unions came
together to form the American Federation
of Labor. For many years, their president
was Samuel Gompers. The AFL and
Gompers promoted what they called
“pure and simple trade unionism.” Their
goal was to improve the lives of trade
union members by bargaining directly
with employers or, when collective
bargaining failed, by striking. In the late
1800s and early 1900s, Samuel Gompers
saw that the courts and governors almost
always ruled in favor of business. The
courts repeatedly agreed to injunctions
against workers for striking. And the

conditions. Unskilled workers in the late

Vocabulary

1800s were largely unsuccessful when

injunction, n. a court order that specifies
an action a person or group must or must
not take

called trade unions. Unskilled workers’
unions are often called labor unions. And
today, there are unions—sometimes
called associations or organizations—for
doctors, nurses, teachers, firefighters,
police officers, and many other jobs.
A worker in the late 1800s who stood
at a machine all day doing the same
task, or a laborer laying railroad tracks
or digging ditches, had few protections.
That person’s job could easily be taken by
someone else. Those deemed unskilled
workers had little ability to bargain with

they tried to form unions.

17

courts rarely ruled against employers for

The AFL worked to protect skilled

mistreating or underpaying workers.

workers’ jobs, pay, benefits, and working

Gompers learned his trade union tactics

conditions. But it did little to aid the
organizing efforts of semiskilled or

by experience. He had grown up poor in

unskilled workers, including tens of

London, England, and immigrated to the
United States in his youth. In New York, he

thousands of women and child laborers.

became a cigar roller, and he joined the
New York cigar workers’ union. Gompers

Strikes and Retaliation

watched as that union sought help from
the government to end “tenement-

Labor strife in the period from 1865 to
1914 was at times intense. There were
hundreds of strikes each year across
America. And labor actions—strikes or
lockouts—sometimes turned violent as
workers made demands and employers
pushed back.

house production” of cigars. The New
York state legislature twice passed laws
making tenement-house production
illegal. But then New York State’s
courts twice invalidated those laws. In
response, Gompers and his union, as

Vocabulary
invalidate, v. to prove
incorrect or illegal

Gompers wrote,
“harassed the
manufacturers
by strikes and

agitation.” Through these actions, the
skilled workers achieved “what [they] had
failed to achieve through legislation.”
Early on, the AFL was not open to the idea
of allowing women or Black Americans to
join their trade unions. In the 1890s, Sam
Gompers seemed open to including other
races. He said to the white members of the
AFL, “As working men we are not justified
in refusing them [Black Americans] the
right of the opportunity to organize.” But
ten years later, he abandoned this view.

18

One incident occurred at Chicago’s
Haymarket Square on May 4, 1886, when a
peaceful rally in support of union workers
and the eight-hour day turned suddenly
violent. Someone in the crowd threw a
bomb at the police. A police officer was
killed by the bomb. In the confusion
that followed, police opened fire, and a
number of police officers and civilians
were killed. In the aftermath, eight
people were convicted of conspiracy.
Four of them were hanged, though the
bomb thrower was never identified. The
Haymarket incident attracted international
attention. Employers used it as an
example of how the labor movement was
full of foreigners, anarchists, and radicals.

Unions can be powerful, and when
workers strike, they can sometimes
win better wages, hours, and working
conditions. But this was not the case in
the dispute between labor and capital in
the Homestead Steel Strike of 1892.

Think Twice
Why do you think employers resisted
workers’ demands for shorter hours
and better working conditions?

Labor Day

The Carnegie Steel Company was owned
by Andrew Carnegie and his business
partner, Henry Frick. They employed
more than three thousand workers
at the company’s Homestead Steel
Works, located just outside Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. Frick and Carnegie had
installed new equipment and processes
for making steel at Homestead. When the
steelworkers’ union, the Amalgamated
Association, tried to enforce their
union’s contract with the Carnegie Steel
Company, the company built a tall fence
around the steel mills and announced
that the plant would reopen without
union workers. On July 6, 1892, a group
of three hundred men from the Pinkerton
Detective Agency, who were working
for Carnegie and Frick, approached the
Homestead Steel Works by boat. Gunfire
erupted between strikers on the shore
and the Pinkerton men. Three Pinkertons
and seven workers were killed in the
exchange of gunfire. Within days, the
governor of Pennsylvania sent eight
thousand soldiers to Homestead, and the
plant was reopened. The workers had lost.

Labor Day is a federal holiday in
the United States, created to honor
American workers and the American
labor movement. The holiday also
celebrates the achievements of workers
who have labored to develop this
nation. It became a federal holiday
in 1894 and is celebrated on the first
Monday in September.

Chicago Haymarket labor riot, 1886

19

Captains of Industry or Robber Barons?
The influence of America’s wealthiest
entrepreneurs and business leaders
increased in the late 1800s and early
1900s. Andrew Carnegie, John D.
Rockefeller, and
Vocabulary
J. P. Morgan were
entrepreneur, n. a
three of the richest
person who starts a
and most successful
business
entrepreneurs in
history. Carnegie made his money in
steel, Rockefeller made his money in oil,
and Morgan made his in banking and
investing. In 1901, J. P. Morgan even
bought Andrew Carnegie’s steel company
for $480 million! Some Americans saw
these men and business leaders like
them as “captains of industry”—that is,
they saw the good that these men were
doing by leading important businesses.
Their corporations employed thousands
of workers, and each of those workers
earned money they might otherwise not
have had. But other Americans criticized
the men as “robber barons,” describing
them as rich men who made their millions
off the labor of those they employed.

Carnegie in particular was a great
philanthropist. A philanthropist is
someone who uses their money to help
others. And Carnegie did this in a big
way. In 1889, he wrote an article called
“The Gospel of Wealth” in which he
said that wealthy people should make
use of their wealth to improve society.
Wealthy people, Carnegie said, should
be philanthropists. During his lifetime,
Andrew Carnegie gave away much of his
wealth; he donated millions of dollars to
charities, foundations, and universities,
and he paid for the building of hundreds
of public libraries across America.

Think Twice
What do you think? Were the men
described here captains of industry or
robber barons?

Andrew Carnegie made a great deal of money in steel.
He also donated money to build libraries and schools.

20

people to help run their business, just as
Andrew Carnegie hired people to work in

“Free Enterprise” vs.
Government Regulation

the steel company he owned. The idea of
free enterprise is that individuals should
be able to decide what goods or services

From colonial times to today, the United

their business will offer to consumers.

States economy has largely functioned

They are in charge. And if everyone is

under the system of commercial society

allowed the freedom to pursue a plan for

or “free enterprise.” For more than a

making money through a business, and

century, the United States has been, the

if that business can be run without too

richest country in the world.

much government regulation, then that

Vocabulary

free enterprise should, in theory, lead to

free enterprise, n. the freedom
of businesses to operate without
government interference

a growing economy in which Americans
benefit economically.

One of the biggest issues for Americans
is the question of how much citizens
want the government to make laws,
rules, and policies to regulate private
businesses. This question is really

Vocabulary
regulate, v. to
control or place
limits on

important. After all, the
government belongs
to its citizens—it is, as
Abraham Lincoln said, a
government of, by, and

for the American people. When should
people reach for the government and ask
their representatives to make laws that
have to do with private enterprise?
In the United States, if someone has
a good idea, they can start their own
business. It’s their business. They can hire

21

But in the late 1800s, the American people
spoke up. Congress—which is the voice of
the American people—created the Interstate
Commerce Commission (ICC) in 1887.
By making the law that created the ICC,
Congress said that Americans can use the
government to regulate private businesses.
At first, the goal was to address unfair
practices that some people accused the
railroads of (such as charging clients different
amounts of money for shipping goods). In
1890, Congress passed the Sherman Antitrust Act (named after Senator John Sherman
of Ohio), which made monopolies illegal.
A monopoly is when a corporation owns all,
or almost all, of an industry. For example,
by the early 1890s, John Rockefeller owned
about ninety percent of the oil refineries in
the United States—he had a monopoly in
the oil industry.

Remember Adam Smith and his 1776 book
about the economy? He had cautioned

Populism and the Gold Standard

against monopolies because a monopoly
can increase prices for consumers. For
example, if there is only one gas station in a
town, the owner could charge a high price

Many farmers, especially in the Midwest,
turned to a political movement called
populism in the late 1800s. Farmers

for gas. But if there are several gas stations

during this time

in a town, then each gas station’s owner

had an interesting

will have to compete for business with

problem. There were

other stations. This way, the gas stations

many farmers in the

are more likely to lower their prices.

United States, and a

Competition encourages innovation, cost-

lot of them were so

cutting, and improvements of all sorts.

successful at growing

So, with the ICC and the Sherman Act,

Vocabulary
populism, n. a
political movement
in the 1890s
that claimed to
represent ordinary
people

food that they grew more food than

the American people, through Congress,

people could eat. Having too much of a

took some of the first steps in using the
government to regulate private businesses.

product—in this case, corn and wheat—is
called a glut. Farmers who had a lot of
grain ended up competing with other
farmers to sell their crops, and they
started to try to undersell each other. That
is, they lowered the price of the grain
they had grown on their farm. But prices
dropped so low that farmers had to sell
their grain for less money than it cost
them to grow it.
It was a bad situation, so farmers looked

“The Octopus Who Strangles the World,” a cartoon
from The Minneapolis Times, shows the dangers of
monopolies.

Find Out the Facts
Find out more about the
monopoly John D. Rockefeller had in the
oil industry in the late 1800s.

to the government for help. One idea that
some populists suggested was that the
government could help farmers build silos
in which to store their grain. Then, when
prices increased, the farmers could sell
their grain at a profit. Another idea that

22

was very popular among populists, both

people who only wanted to use gold and

farmers and some working people, was

who opposed using silver were wrong.

that the government could use its power

He concluded his speech with the words,

to create inflation. The populists wanted

“You shall not press down upon the brow

the government to cause inflation by

of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not

adding more money into the economy.

Vocabulary
inflation, n. a rise
in prices and a fall
in the purchasing
value of money

At the time, the
federal government
used gold as a basis
for money. But the
populists suggested
that the government

should allow silver to be used as money,
too. They said that if silver were added to
the money supply, there would be more
money, which would cause the inflation

crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.”
And as he said this, he threw his arms
wide as he stood before the hundreds of
people gathered in the convention hall.
Having finished his speech, he walked
slowly back to his seat. There was dead
silence in the hall. Bryan wondered to
himself if the people had liked his speech.
But then, after a few seconds, there was
thunderous applause. People in the

they were looking for. Many of the farmers audience went wild. They cheered and
who were populists had borrowed money threw their hats in the air; they hugged
from banks, and they reasoned that if they one another in great joy. Bryan’s speech
had been a great success. But while his
could pay the banks back with inflated
dollars, then they would come out ahead.

speech was a success, his plan did not

A man named William Jennings Bryan

succeed. By 1900, President William

In 1896, he gave a famous speech at

directly to gold.

thought the populists had a good idea. He McKinley had put the nation on the gold
standard, a system that links money
supported adding silver to the economy.
the Democratic Party Convention. His
speech is called the “Cross of Gold.” In

Think Twice

it, he declared that the United States

Who or what do you think Bryan was
referring to when he used the words
“crown of thorns”?

government should allow silver as well
as gold to be used. At the very end of
his speech, he did a thing that drew
people’s attention. He said that the

23