A Brief History of the United States Part 50

3. Some of their demands were enacted into laws, as the silver coinage act, the exclusion of the Chinese, the anti-contract-labor and interstate commerce acts, the establishment of a national labor bureau, and the ant.i.trust act.

4. In 1890-97 the tariff was three times revised by the McKinley, Wilson, and Dingley acts.

5. In the political world the most notable events were the contested election of 1876-77; the recall of United States troops from the South, and the fall of carpetbag governments; the a.s.sa.s.sination of Garfield; and the two defeats of the national Republican ticket (1884 and 1892).

6. In the financial world the chief events were the panics of 1873 and 1893, the resumption of specie payment (1879), and the free-silver issue.

7. In the world at large we had trouble with Chile, Hawaii, and Great Britain.

FOOTNOTES

[1] After the discovery of gold in California, Chinamen, called coolies, came to that state in considerable numbers. But they attracted little attention till 1852, when the governor complained that they were sent out by Chinese capitalists under contract, that the gold they dug was sent to China, and that they worked for wages so low that no American could compete with them. Attempts were then made to stop their importation, especially by heavy taxes laid on them. But the courts declared such taxation illegal, and appeals were then made to Congress for relief. No action was taken; but in 1868 an old treaty with China was amended, and to import Chinamen without their free consent was made a penal offense. This did not prevent their coming, so the demand was made for their exclusion by act of Congress.

[2] In the early years of the nineteenth century liquor was a part of the workingman's wages. Every laborer on the farm, in the harvest field, every sailor, and men employed in many of the trades, as carpenters and masons, demanded daily grog at the cost of the employer. About 1810 a temperance movement put an end to much of this. But intemperance remained the curse of the workingman down to the days of Van Buren and Tyler, when a greater temperance movement began.

[3] Horace Greeley was born in New Hamps.h.i.+re in 1811, and while still a lad learned the trade of printer. When he went to New York in 1831, he was so poor that he walked the streets in search of work. During the Harrison campaign in 1840 he edited the Log Cabin, a Whig newspaper, and soon after the election founded the New York Tribune. In 1848 he was elected a member of Congress. He was one of the signers of the bond which released Jefferson Davis from imprisonment after the Civil War. Greeley overexerted himself in the campaign of 1872, and died a few weeks after the election.

[4] The fire is said to have been started by a cow kicking over a lamp in a small barn. Nearly 2200 acres were burned over, some 17,450 buildings consumed, 200 lives were lost, and 98,000 people made homeless.

[5] The close of the first century of our national independence was the occasion of a great exposition in Philadelphia--the first of many that have been held in our country on centennial anniversaries of great events in our history. The Philadelphia exposition was first planned as a mammoth fair for the display of the industries and arts of the United States; but Congress having approved the idea, all foreign nations were invited to take part, and thirty-three did so. The main building covered some twenty acres and was devoted to the display of manufactures. The exposition occupied also four other large buildings devoted to machinery, agriculture, etc., of which Horticultural Hall and Memorial Hall are still standing.

[6] Rutherford B. Hayes was born in Ohio in 1822, and after graduating from Kenyon College and the Harvard Law School settled at Fremont, Ohio, but soon moved to Cincinnati. At the opening of the war he joined the Union army and by 1865 had risen to the rank of brevet major general.

While still in the army, he was elected to Congress, served two terms, and was then twice elected governor of Ohio. In 1875 he was elected for a third term. He died in 1893.

[7] The commission consisted of five senators, five representatives, and five justices of the Supreme Court; eight were Republicans, and seven Democrats.

[8] By 185 electoral votes against 184 for Tilden. The popular vote at the election of 1876 was (according to the Republican claim): for Hayes, 4,033,768; for Tilden, 4,285,992; for Peter Cooper (Greenback-Labor or "Independent"), 81,737; for Green Clay Smith (Prohibition), 9522.

[9] The strikers' grievances were reduction of wages, irregular employment, irregular payment of wages, and forced patronage of company hotels. There were riots at Baltimore, Chicago, Reading, and other places besides Pittsburg; state militia was called out to quell the disorder; and at the request of the state governors, United States troops were sent to Pennsylvania, Maryland, and West Virginia.

[10] Specie payment was accordingly begun on January 1, 1879, and then for the first time since greenbacks were made legal tender they were accepted everywhere at par with coin. By the provisions of other laws, the amount of greenbacks kept in circulation was fixed at $346,681,000.

[11] The price of silver in 1872 was such that the 412-1/2 grains in the dollar were worth $1.02 in gold money. The silver dollar was worth more as silver bullion than as money, and was therefore little used as money.

This dropping of the silver dollar from the list of coins, or ceasing to coin it, was called the "demonetization of silver."

[12] To carry any number of these "cart-wheel dollars" in the pocket would have been inconvenient, because of their size and weight. Provision was therefore made that the dollars might be deposited in the United States treasury and paper "silver certificates" issued against them. Get specimens of different kinds of paper money, read the words printed on a silver certificate, and compare with the wording on a greenback (United States note) and on a national bank note.

[13] James A. Garfield was born in Ohio in 1831. While still a lad. he longed to be a sailor, and failing in this, he became a ca.n.a.l boatman.

After a little experience as such he went back to school, supporting himself by working as a carpenter and teaching school. In 1854 he entered the junior cla.s.s of Williams College, graduated in 1856, became a teacher in Hiram Inst.i.tute, was elected to the Ohio senate in 1859, and joined the Union army in 1861. In 1862 he was elected to Congress, took his seat in December, 1863, and continued to be a member of the House of Representatives till 1881.

[14] Chester Alan Arthur was born in Vermont in 1830, graduated from Union College, became (1853) a lawyer in New York city, and was (1871-78) customs collector of the port of New York. In 1880 he attended the national Republican convention as a delegate from New York, and was one of the 302 members of that convention who voted to the last for the renomination of Grant. After Grant was defeated and Garfield nominated, Arthur was named for the vice presidency, in order to appease the "Stalwarts," as the friends of Grant were called.

[15] When this failed to accomplish its purpose, Congress (1887) enacted another law providing heavy penalties for polygamy. The Mormon Church then declared against the practice.

[16] The murder of Garfield led also to a new presidential succession law.

The old law provided that if both the President and the Vice President should die, the office should be filled temporarily by the president _pro tem_ of the Senate, or if there were none, by the speaker of the House of Representatives. But one Congress expired March 4, 1881, and the next one did not meet and elect its presiding officers till December; so if Arthur had died before then, there would have been no one to act as President. A new law pa.s.sed in 1886 provides that if both the presidency and the vice presidency become vacant, the presidency shall pa.s.s to the Secretary of State, or, if there be none, to the Secretary of the Treasury, or, if necessary, to the Secretary of War, Attorney General, Postmaster General, Secretary of the Navy, or Secretary of the Interior.

[17] In 1881, Lieutenant A. W. Greely was sent to plant a station in the Arctic regions. Supplies sent in 1882 and 1883 failed to reach him, and alarm was felt for the safety of his party. In 1884 a rescue expedition was sent out under Commander W. S. Schley. Three vessels were made ready by the Navy Department, and a fourth by Great Britain. After a long search Greely and six companions were found on the point of starvation and five were brought safely home. During their stay in the Arctic, they had reached a point within 430 miles of the north pole, the farthest north any white man had then gone.

[18] Grover Cleveland was born in New Jersey in 1837. In 1841 his father, a Presbyterian minister, removed to Onondaga County, New York, where Grover attended school and served as clerk in the village store. Later he taught for a year in the Inst.i.tute for the Blind in New York city; but soon began the study of law, and settled in Buffalo. He was a.s.sistant district attorney of Erie County, sheriff and mayor of Buffalo, and in 1882, as the Democratic candidate for governor of New York, carried the state by 192,000 plurality. Both when mayor and when governor he was noted for his free use of the veto power.

[19] In 1885 the Bartholdi statue of Liberty Enlightening the World was formally received at New York. It was a gift from the people of France to the people of America. A hundred thousand Frenchmen contributed the money for the statue, and the pedestal was built with money raised in the United States. An island in New York harbor was chosen for the site, and there the statue was unveiled in October, 1886. The top of Liberty's torch is 365 feet above low water.

In September, 1886, a severe earthquake occurred near Charleston, South Carolina, the vibrations of which were felt as far away as Cape Cod and Milwaukee. In Charleston most of the houses were made unfit for habitation, many persons were killed, and some $8,000,000 worth of property was destroyed.

[20] Benjamin Harrison, the grandson of President William Henry Harrison, was born at North Bend, Ohio, in 1833. He was educated at Miami University, studied law, settled at Indianapolis, and when the war opened, was reporter to the supreme court of Indiana. Joining the volunteers as a lieutenant, he was brevetted brigadier general before the war ended. In 1881 he became a senator from Indiana. He died in 1901.

[21] This required the Secretary of the Treasury to buy each month 4,500,000 ounces of silver, pay for it with treasury notes, and redeem the notes on demand in coin. After July 1, 1891, the silver so purchased need not be coined, but might be stored and silver certificates issued against it.

[22] Soon after the war the farmers in the great agricultural states had formed a.s.sociations under such names as the Grange, Patrons of Husbandry, Patrons of Industry, Agricultural Wheel, Farmers' Alliance, and others.

About 1886 they began to unite, and formed the National Agricultural Wheel and the Farmers' Alliance and Cooperative Union. In 1889 these and others were united in a convention at St. Louis into the Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Union.

[23] The electoral vote was: for Cleveland, 277; Harrison, 145; Weaver, 22. The popular vote was: Democratic, 5,556,543; Republican, 5,175,582; Populist, 1,040,886; Prohibition, 255,841; Socialist Labor, 21,532.

[24] Cleveland objected to certain features of the bill, and refused to sign it; but he did not veto it. By the Const.i.tution, if the President neither signs a bill nor returns it with his veto within ten days (Sunday excepted) after he receives it, the bill becomes a law without his signature, provided Congress has not meanwhile adjourned. If Congress adjourns before the ten-day limit expires and the President does not sign, then the bill does not become a law, but is "pocket vetoed."

[25] Because Congress had made the tax uniform--the same on incomes of the same amount everywhere--instead of fixing the total amount to be raised and dividing it among the states according to population, as required by the Const.i.tution in the case of direct taxes.

[26] The franchise has been slightly narrowed in some Northern states by educational qualifications; but, on the other hand, in four states it has been extended to women on the same terms as men--in Wyoming (since 1869), Colorado (since 1893), Utah (since 1895), and Idaho (since 1896). In nearly half the states, women can now vote in school elections. In Kansas they vote also in munic.i.p.al elections.

[27] They demanded "the free and unlimited coinage of both silver and gold at the present legal ratio of 16 to 1"; that is, that out of one pound of gold should be coined as many dollars as out of sixteen pounds of silver.

[28] William McKinley was born in Ohio in 1843, attended Allegheny College for a short time, then taught a district school, and was a clerk in a country post office. When the Civil War opened, he joined the army as a private in a regiment in which Hayes was afterwards colonel, served through the war, and was brevetted major for gallantry at Cedar Creek and Fishers Hill. The war over, he became a lawyer, entered politics in Ohio, and was elected a member of seven Congresses. From 1892 to 1896 he was governor of Ohio.

[29] The Gold Democrats nominated John M. Palmer; and the Prohibitionists, the National party, and the Socialist Labor party also named candidates.

But none of these parties cast so many as 150,000 popular votes or secured any electoral votes.

[30] We contended that we had jurisdiction in Bering Sea; that the seals rearing their young on our islands in that sea were our property; that even though they temporarily went far out into the Pacific Ocean they were under our protection. Our revenue cutters had therefore seized Canadian vessels taking seals in the open sea.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

THE WAR WITH SPAIN, AND LATER EVENTS

THE CUBAN REBELLION.--In February, 1895, the Cubans, for the sixth time in fifty years, rose in rebellion against Spain, and attempted to form a republic. These proceedings concerned us for several reasons. American trade with Cuba was interrupted; American money invested in Cuban mines, railroads, and plantations might be lost; our ports were used by the Cubans in fitting out military expeditions which our government was forced to stop at great expense; the cruelty with which the war was waged aroused indignation. During the summer of 1897 the suffering of Cuban non- combatants was so great that our people began to send them food and medical aid.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CUBA AND PORTO RICO.]

DESTRUCTION OF THE MAINE.--While our people were engaged in this humane work, our battles.h.i.+p _Maine_, riding at anchor in the harbor of Havana, was blown up (February 15, 1898) and two hundred and sixty of her sailors killed. War was now inevitable, and on April 19 Congress adopted a resolution demanding that Spain should withdraw from Cuba, and authorizing the President to compel her to leave if necessary. [1] Spain at once severed diplomatic relations, and (April 21, 1898) war began.

THE BATTLE AT MANILA BAY.--A fleet which had a.s.sembled at Key West sailed at once to blockade Havana and other ports on the coast of Cuba. Another under Commodore Dewey sailed from Hongkong to attack the Spanish fleet in the Philippine Islands. Dewey found it in Manila Bay, where on the morning of May 1, 1898, he attacked and destroyed it without losing a man or a s.h.i.+p. The city of Manila was then blockaded, and General Merritt with twenty thousand men was sent across the Pacific to take possession of the Philippines.

BLOCKADE OF CERVERA'S FLEET.--Meantime a second Spanish fleet, under Admiral Cervera (thair-va'ra), sailed from the Cape Verde Islands. Acting Rear-Admiral Sampson, with s.h.i.+ps which had been blockading Havana, and Commodore Schley, with a "flying squadron," went in search of Cervera, who, after a long hunt, was found in the harbor of Santiago on the south coast of Cuba, and at once blockaded. [2]