Themes: Explanations of Inequality in the Gilded Age; The Development of American Empire. Corresponds to Ch. 17 in your textbook.

1. The Gilded Age to Empire
HIST 12:
Week 4

2. Explaining
Inequality
• Social Darwinism: the fittest survive,
so blame the poor; blame
immigrants
• “Scientific” racism - Northern
Europeans are racially superior to all
other people
• evolution shows the
distinctiveness of the races
• racial hierarchy - science defines
who is white (of Aryan stock)
and who is not
William Graham Sumner

3. Pictures like the one on the right
compare Irish to monkeys.
The one on the top explains why
Irish people are poor by explaining
they are racially inferior.
Both are offensive images not based
in actual science.

4. image source: http://www.understandingrace.org/history/science/measuring_race.html
This picture portrays a different kind of offensive
racial logic. It suggests that black people are lower
on the evolutionary chain than white people. This is
absolutely false. However, these theories had many
believers in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

5. In the cities:
Nativism
• New industrial workers are
largely immigrants from
southern and eastern Europe
• Immigration Restriction
League (1894) - rallies to
prohibit immigration of
illiterate people; vote
restricted to literate

6. Chinese
Immigrants
• 1882: Congress excludes
Chinese immigrants
• 105,000 persons of Chinese
descent in U.S.
• Mobs and assault
• Legal battles for public
schools: Tape v. Hurley
(1885)
http://
content.cdlib.org/ark:/
13030/hb9n39p05s/
https://www.nwhm.org/
online-exhibits/chinese/
31.html

7. Segregation• Segregation extended beyond
black/white:
• In MS, different schools for
blacks, whites, and Chinese
• In CA, same schools for
everyone but Chinese
• Mexicans legally white, but
barred from many public
places in CA and TX

8. Outside the
Law: Lynching
• Public violence -
sometimes advertised
• Torture as well as murder
• Grisly souvenirs
• Ida B.Wells - anti-lynching
crusader
http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/omalley/race/two.html

9. These horrifying images were sold as postcards - souvenirs of brutal
violence. See the next slide for the back of this postcard.

11. Black
Responses
• Female activism: National
Association of Colored
Women (founded 1896)
• Exodus: 40,000-60,000
African Americans to
Kansas, 1879-1880
• Booker T.Washington: self-
help and economic uplift,
do not confront racism
Source:http://blsciblogs.baruch.cuny.edu/
his1005fall2010/2010/09/28/ho-for-kansas/

12. The Gilded Age/1890s
• How did people respond to the economic
inequalities that grew up in the Second
Industrial Revolution?
• What is Social Darwinism?
• What are some examples of discrimination
in the U.S. in this time period?

13. An American Empire
• The racial thinking that led to indifference to poverty and
to horrifying racial violence at home helped Americans to
justify
• the conquest of other countries
• denying the residents of those countries access to
American democracy
• American Empire was not merely - or even mostly - an
expression of American racism, though. It was a way for
the U.S. to express growing power and importance. What
other reasons do you see in the slides?

15. American
Expansionism• Why?
• For their own
good
• To be a world
power
(everybody’s
doing it!)
• To foster
American unity
• To expand trade
Source: http://www.teachingushistory.org/

16. Power
• Navy and
trade go
hand-in-
hand
• Need
strategic
naval bases:
Hawaii,
Puerto Rico,
Cuba
Source: http://www.teachingushistory.org/

17. Trade
• Strategic naval bases would also protect trade routes:
• Hawaii (and later, Philippines) - access to Asia
• Puerto Rico and Cuba - access to Latin America

18. Hawaii
• Close ties to U.S. in
1890s
• 1893:American planters
organize coup to
overthrow Queen
Liluokalani
• 1898: U.S. annexes
Hawaii
Source: http://www.library.southernct.edu/
americanimperialism.htm

19. • Consciousness of
ethnic diversity -
nativism
• Increased fear of
division with 1893
economic depression
• Patriotism: Pledge of
Allegiance; standing for
“Star-Spangled Banner”
• Nationalist newspapers
- the “yellow press”
sensationalism and
aggressive patriotism
Unity

20. Spanish-American War, 1898

21. Cuba and the
Spanish-American
War
• Cubans fought an
insurgency against Spain:
1868-1878; 1895-1898
• José Martí:“This is not the
century of struggle of
races but rather the
century of the affirmation
of rights.” (Quoted in
Ferrer, Insurgent Cuba,195)
• Cuban revolution explicitly
antiracist; U.S. intervention
marked by racism

22. The Spanish- American War• Yellow journalism
and the Maine: 270
people died
• McKinley to war:
business and public
pressure
• Teller Amendment -
Cuban Independence
following Spanish
defeat (did not stick)
• A “splendid little
war” - 4 mos, less
than 4,000 American
combat deaths Images: utdallas.edu; http://wps.pearsoncustom.com/

23. Theodore Roosevelt
• becomes a hero after
fighting in Spanish-
American War
• thinks war is good for
American manhood
• immediately after war,
elected governor of
NewYork - 2 years
later,Vice President
• (African American
soldiers were first in
the charge on San
Juan Hill)
Images: http://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/

24. American
Empire
• Cubans and
Filipinos
“unprepared” for
independence
• U.S. must “uplift
and civilize” Source: http://library.thinkquest.org/
http://hti.osu.edu/

25. After Spanish-American War
• New colonies: Philippines, Puerto Rico, Guam
• Cuba: independent, but Platt Amendment:
• U.S. military can come whenever
• establishes a naval base at Guantánamo Bay

26. Philippine
War
• Filipinos happy to have U.S. help in struggle
for independence (fighting since 1896)
• Not so happy about U.S. imperialism
• Filipinos fought against U.S., 1899 to 1903 -
100,000 Filipinos and 4,200 Americans died
• McKinley: obligation to “little brown
brothers”
Emilio Aguinaldo -
Independence Leader

27. Limiting Colonies’
Rights
• Puerto Ricans not
U.S. citizens (Foraker
Act of 1900)
• Neither are Filipinos
• Hawaii becomes
“territory” and
residents (except
Asian immigrants) are
citizens
• Racial logic in
assigning rights
http://www.princeton.edu/

29. American
Imperialism
Continues
• 1901-1920: U.S.
marines to Caribbean
more than 20 times
• Protect American
business - access to
raw materials
• Protect American
banks - loan
repayment
• Roosevelt:“speak
softly and carry a big
stick”

31. The Panama Canal
• 1903: Roosevelt helps
Panama to break away
from Colombia
• Independent Panama gives
U.S. rights to build canal,
operate it, and have
sovereignty over Canal
Zone
• 2000, U.S. finally turned
over control to Panama

32. • Roosevelt: U.S. as “police
power” in Western
Hemisphere
• Taft:“Dollar Diplomacy” -
U.S. investment in the
hemisphere
• Wilson: moral
imperialism - in theory,
not an interventionist; but
wants to teach others the
blessings of democracy
Progressive Imperialism

33. Moral Imperialism
• 1915: Marines to Haiti;
U.S. banks to oversee
financial dealings - stay
until 1934
• 1916: military govt. in
Dominican Republic - stay
until 1924
• Wilson in Mexico - 1913
invasion ofVeracruz; 1916

34. Conclusions
• U.S. imperialism begins for multiple reasons,
but economics is a major factor.
• Racial logic that affected domestic affairs
gives the U.S. a sense of superiority over
neighbors.
• Once begun, U.S. interventionism continues,
even if presidents say it won’t.