Going to See the Wizard

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Going to See the Wizard

• Agrarian Discontent and Populism

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Published 1900
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Released 1940
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ON THE FARM
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High Plains Settlement A 70 Year Mistake

• Homesteaders and the Great Plains 1870s
• 1878-1887 Rain follows the Plow
• Drought 1887, 1889-1890
• In God we trusted in Kansas we busted.
• 1893 Depression and Grain Prices
• 1875 Wheat 1.05 per bushel
• 1895 Wheat .67 per bushel
• Farmer Complaints in the 1890s

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Farm Activism

• The Grange (1867)
• Farmers Alliance
• Cooperatives
• Southern Alliance, Colored Farmers Alliance,
  National Farmers Alliance
• 1890 election
• The Populist Party

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The Ideals of Populism

• Rejection of gilded age materialism
• Criticism of capitals treatment of labor
• Opposition to accumulations of wealth
• Critique of the business cycle
• the race question

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POPULIST PARTYS OM AHA PLATFORM

• Free and Unlimited Coinage of Silver
• A Progressive Income Tax
• Government Ownership of the Telegraph and
  Railroad Systems
• Restrictions on Immigration
• End of Injunctions Against Labor Unions

Successes and Failures of the Election of 1892
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William Jennings Bryan
William McKinley
William Jennings Bryan
William McKinley
THE ELECTION OF 1896
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Contest between the producing masses and the
idle holders of idle capital First priority of
government is to make the masses
prosperous. You shall not press down upon the
brow of labor this crown of thorns. You shall
not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.
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Silver
or
Ruby Slippers?
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(No Transcript)
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I dont mind my legs and arms and body being
stuffed, because I cannot get hurt. If anyone
treads on my toes or sticks a pin into me, it
doesnt matter, for I cant feel it. But I do
not want people to call me a fool, and if my head
stays stuffed with straw instead of with brains,
how am I ever to know anything?
Dont mind Toto,said Dorothy, to her new
friend he never bites.
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(No Transcript)
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Populist Party? If the elephants and the tigers
and the bears had ever tried to fight me, I
should have run myself It seems they must
be more cowardly than you are if they allow you
to scare them so easily.
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(No Transcript)
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Electoral Map (1896)
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Results of the 1896 Election

• Republicans control White House from 1896-1912
• Until the Great Depression urban workers and
  Catholics vote Republican
• New election laws in the South designed to
  restrict 3rd parties exclude African-Americans.