Key Concept 6.1 Lecture Notes

Introduction

• Technological advances, large-scale production methods, and opening of new markets encouraged industrial capitalism in the U.S.
• Big Idea Questions:
  • Relationship between businesses and government?
  • Changes and continuities in the South?
  • Responses of farmers and industrial workers to corporations?

I. Large-Scale Industrial Production

• Key Factors:
  • Massive technological change
  • Expanding international communication networks
  • Pro-growth government policies
• Government Role:
  • Provided money and land for railroads (e.g., Pacific Railway Act)
  • Railroads and telegraph lines linked cities and farms
• Impacts:
  • Growth of farms, cities, and lumber industry
  • Increased production of goods via:
    • Technological advances (e.g., Taylorism)
    • Greater access to natural resources
    • Emergence of monopolies (e.g., Rockefeller)
    • Marketing advances (e.g., mail order catalogs)
  • Growing labor force
• Consequences:
  • Decrease in goods prices
  • Increase in worker wages
  • New goods and services emerged
  • Improved American living standards
  • Growing wealth gap

II. Economic and Labor Perspectives

• Laissez-Faire:
  • Little government regulation of industries
  • Favored by businesses
• Industrial Workforce Changes:
  • Internal and international migration
  • Increase in child labor
• Labor vs. Management:
  • Emergence of local and national unions (e.g., Knights of Labor, AFL)
  • Knights of Labor:
    • Included skilled/unskilled workers, women, African Americans
    • Declined after Haymarket Square riot
  • American Federation of Labor:
    • Led by Samuel Gompers
    • Focused on bread and butter issues
• Southern Industrialization:
  • Termed "New South"
  • Increase in textile factories
  • Continued sharecropping and tenant farming

III. Agricultural Production and Farmer Responses

• Production Advances:
  • Mechanized agriculture (e.g., tractors, reapers)
  • Use of grain elevators for storage
• Price Effects:
  • Decrease in food prices hurt farmers
• Farmer Organizations:
  • Grange (1860s) and Southern Farmers Alliance
  • People's (Populist) Party:
    • Stronger government role in economy
    • Addressed corporate power and economic instability
    • Advocated for graduated income tax, inflation, direct election of senators
    • Notable figure: William Jennings Bryan

Test Tips

• Multiple Choice/Short Answer:
  • Understand new business structures, government role, farmer issues
• Essays:
  • Compare government roles across time periods
  • Explore farmer and labor responses to corporations

Conclusion

• Upcoming: Key Concept 6.2
• Best of luck on the exam in May.