Chapter 11 from A Young People's History of the United States

Terms:


Monopoly p. 173
Robber Baron p. 174
"Rags to Riches" p. 172
Labor Union p. 181
Strikebreaker p. 182
"scab" p. 179
Socialism p. 175
Communism p. 175
Anarchism p. 177
Haymarket Affair p. 179
Populism p. 183

Immigrants pouring into the country faster than ever before...

There were ________million immigrants in the 1880s, ________ million in the 1890s, creating a labor surplus that kept wages down. The immigrants were more controllable, more helpless than native workers; they were culturally displaced, at odds with one another, therefore useful as _______________. Often their children worked, intensifying the problem of an oversized labor force and joblessness; in 1880 there were 1,118,000 children under sixteen (one out of six) at work in the United States. With everyone working long hours, families often became strangers to one another.


Most of the new immigrants were from __________________. Immigrants from _____________ streamed into the west coast to work as _______________________. Many became targets of racial attacks, sometimes at the hands of those who had immigrated earlier, such as the Irish. (page 171)


The first transcontinental ___________was built with blood, sweat, politics and thievery, out of the meeting of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads. The _______________ started on the West Coast going east; it spent $200,000 in Washington on bribes to get 9 million acres of free land and $24 million in bonds, and paid $79 million, an overpayment of $36 million, to a construction company which really was its own. The construction was done by three thousand ____________ and ten thousand _______________, over a period of four years, working for _______________ dollars a day. (page 173)


Draw a picture illustrating the division of wealth taking place in the United States at this time. (page 171)


A call for wide-scale strikes:


A meeting was called for _______________Square on the evening of May 4, and about three thousand persons assembled. It was a quiet meeting, and as storm clouds gathered and the hour grew late, the crowd dwindled to a few hundred. A detachment of 180 policemen showed up, advanced on the speakers' platform, ordered the crowd to disperse. The speaker said the meeting was almost over. A __________ then exploded in the midst of the police, wounding sixty-six policemen, of whom seven later died. The police fired into the crowd, killing several people, wounding two hundred.


With no evidence on who threw the bomb, the police arrested eight anarchist leaders in Chicago. Illinois law said that anyone inciting a murder was guilty of that murder. The evidence against the eight anarchists was their ideas, their literature; none had been at Haymarket that day except Fielden, who was speaking when the bomb exploded. A jury found them ___________, and they were sentenced to____________. Their ______________ were denied; the Supreme Court said it had no jurisdiction. (pages 179-181)


A new movement:


In general, _____________ were against monopolies and ______________. They did not agree, however, on _________. Many were also against new immigrants. They especially opposed immigration from _________ and __________ Europe and from ______________. (p. 183)

Comments

Popular Posts