history paper

Jinyang He

TheGospelofWealth.pdf

Home >History homework help >American history homework help >history paper

A D o c u m e n t a r y R e a d e r

EDITED BY

WILLIAM A. LINK AND SUSANNAH J. LINK

THE

GILDED AGE AND

PROGRESSIVE ERA

EDITED BY

LINK AND

LINK

U n c o v e r i n g T h e P a s t D o c u m e n t a r y R e a d e r s i n A m e r i c a n H i s t o r y

“This treasure trove of documents is a terrifi c classroom resource. The Links chose carefully to achieve geographic, chronological, and thematic balance. The book’s organization represents all aspects of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era and ties them together interpretatively. Professors will fi nd themselves assigning documents from the reader week after week. This is one of the most useful teaching books I’ve seen.”

Glenda Gilmore, Yale University

“Three cheers for William and Susannah Link, whose documentary reader offers interpretive structure and focus alongside its thoughtfully chosen collection of primary sources. This reader is authoritative while still compact, giving enough points of view to spark controversy without closing down conversation. It is the perfect companion to the US survey or more specialized courses in modern American history.”

Jane Dailey, University of Chicago

“Wisely selected fi rst-person accounts coupled with the editors’ trenchant introductions bring to life civics and society at the dawn of modern America. It is a valuable resource that will engage students.”

Andrew Haley, University of Southern Mississippi

Following the conclusion of the Civil War and Reconstruction, the Progressive Era brought a wholesale restructuring of social and political institutions. The period from the 1870s through World War I was characterized by the nationalization of American life, the establishment of the United States as a global power, the refashioning of social relationships, and the reconstruction of the political system.

This volume gathers together documents that illustrate the variety of experiences and themes involved in the transformation of American political, economic, and social systems during this period, and presents the essential perspectives of race, class, gender, and culture. Situating the documents within their historical context, the book is divided into fi ve thematic sections: the American frontier after Reconstruction; the transformations that arrived with industrialization; the social and political crisis that gripped the United States at the end of the nineteenth century; reform; imperialism and war.

This collection enables readers to engage actively in historical interpretation and to understand the interplay between social and political forces in the period, exploring the experiences of people during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era from a variety of diverse perspectives.

William A. Link is Richard J. Milbauer Professor of History at the University of Florida. His publications include Roots of Secession: Slavery and Politics in Antebellum Virginia (2003) and Righteous Warrior: Jesse Helms and the Rise of Modern American Conservatism (2008).

Susannah J. Link is instructor in American history at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro.

Cover image: ‘The Trust Giant’s Point of View’, cartoon by Horace Taylor showing John D. Rockefeller holding the White House and President McKinley in the palm of his hand, 1900. © Photos 12/Alamy.

Cover design by Simon Levy

T H

E G

IL D

E D

A G

E A

N D

P R

O G

R E

S S

IV E

E R

Blackwell Publishing was acquired by John Wiley & Sons in February 2007. Blackwell’s publishing program has been merged with Wiley’s global Scientific, Technical, and Medical business to form Wiley‐Blackwell.

Registered Office John Wiley & Sons Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK

Editorial Offices 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148–5020, USA 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK

For details of our global editorial offices, for customer services, and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at www.wiley.com/wiley‐blackwell .

The right of William A. Link and Susannah J. Link to be identified as the authors of the editorial material in this work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books.

Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publisher is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold on the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services. If professional advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional should be sought.

Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data

The Gilded Age and Progressive Era : a documentary reader / edited by William A. Link and Susannah J. Link. p. cm. – (Uncovering the past : documentary readers in American history ; 12) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4443-3138-7 (hardback) – ISBN 978-1-4443-3139-4 (paperback) 1. United States–History–1865-1921–Sources. 2. United States–Politics and government–1865-1933–Sources. 3. United States–Social conditions–1865-1918–Sources. 4. Progressivism (United States politics)–Sources. I. Link, William A. II. Link, Susannah J. E661.G455 2012 973.8–dc23

2011034658

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Set in 10/12.5pt Sabon by SPi Publisher Services, Pondicherry, India

1 2012

ffirs.indd ivffirs.indd iv 11/24/2011 3:07:15 PM11/24/2011 3:07:15 PM

Chapter 4 Big Business

1 Andrew Carnegie, “The Gospel of Wealth,” 1889 1

Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919) was one of the most successful entrepreneurs of his day. An emigrant from Scotland, he worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad and then moved into the iron and steel industry, eventually founding the Carnegie Steel Company, in Pittsburgh. By the 1880s, Carnegie had become one of the wealthiest steel producers in the United States, and his fortune was worth hundreds of millions of dollars. In this document, Carnegie proposed a unique vision of philanthropy. Like Carnegie, there were other Americans who had created fantastic private fortunes during the Gilded Age – and their fortunes were much too large to spend on themselves.

Carnegie advocated a new philosophy of giving – that the new wealth created by the Industrial Revolution be plowed back into philanthropy. Addressing his fellow class of the great wealthy, Carnegie urged the distribution of wealth – by enriched big businessmen. By his death in 1919, Carnegie was largely successful in giving his money away to various philanthropies that supported education and the construction of new libraries across the United States.

1 Andrew Carnegie, “Wealth,” North American Review 148, no. 391 (June 1889): 653, 657–62.

c04.indd 67c04.indd 67 11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM

68 The Gilded Age and Progressive Era

The problem of our age is the administration of wealth, so that the ties of brotherhood may still bind together the rich and poor in harmonious relationship. The conditions of human life have not only been changed, but revolutionized, within the past few hundred years. In former days there was little difference between the dwelling, dress, food, and environment of the chief and those of his retainers. . . . The contrast between the palace of the millionaire and the cottage of the laborer with us to -day measures the change which has come with civilization.

This change, however, is not to be deplored, but welcomed as highly beneficial. It is well, nay, essential for the progress of the race, that the houses of some should be homes for all that is highest and best in literature and the arts, and for all the refinements of civilization, rather than that none should be so. Much better this great irregularity than universal squalor. Without wealth there can be no Maecenas. 2 The “good old times” were not good old times. Neither master nor servant was as well situated then as to‐day. A relapse to old conditions would be disastrous to both‐not the least so to him who serves—and would sweep away civilization with it. . . .

. . .

We start, then, with a condition of affairs under which the best interests of the race are promoted, but which inevitably gives wealth to the few. Thus far, accepting conditions as they exist, the situation can be surveyed and pronounced good. The question then arises—and, if the foregoing be correct, it is the only question with which we have to deal—What is the proper mode of administering wealth after the laws upon which civilization is founded have thrown it into the hands of the few? And it is of this great question that I believe I offer the true solution. It will be understood that fortunes are here spoken of, not moderate sums saved by many years of effort, the returns from which are required for the comfortable maintenance and education of families. This is not wealth, but only competence, which it should be the aim of all to acquire.

There are but three modes in which surplus wealth can be disposed of. It can be left to the families of the decedents; or it can be bequeathed for public purposes; or, finally, it can be administered during their lives by its posses- sors. Under the first and second modes most of the wealth of the world that has reached the few has hitherto been applied. Let us in turn consider each of these modes. The first is the most injudicious. In monarchial countries,

2 Gaius Cilnius Maecenas (70–8 bce ) was a supporter of Roman Emperor Octavian. He was also a major patron of the arts, and his name came to represent private support for the arts.

c04.indd 68c04.indd 68 11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM

Big Business 69

the estates and the greatest portion of the wealth are left to the first son, that the vanity of the parent may be gratified by the thought that his name and title are to descend to succeeding generations unimpaired. The condi- tion of this class in Europe to day teaches the futility of such hopes or ambitions. The successors have become impoverished through their follies or from the fall in the value of land. . . . Why should men leave great fortunes to their children? If this is done from affection, is it not misguided affection? Observation teaches that, generally speaking, it is not well for the children that they should be so burdened. Neither is it well for the state. Beyond providing for the wife and daughters moderate sources of income, and very moderate allowances indeed, if any, for the sons, men may well hesitate, for it is no longer questionable that great sums bequeathed oftener work more for the injury than for the good of the recipients. Wise men will soon conclude that, for the best interests of the members of their families and of the state, such bequests are an improper use of their means.

. . .

As to the second mode, that of leaving wealth at death for public uses, it may be said that this is only a means for the disposal of wealth, provided a man is content to wait until he is dead before it becomes of much good in the world. . . . The cases are not few in which the real object sought by the testator is not attained, nor are they few in which his real wishes are thwarted. . . .

The growing disposition to tax more and more heavily large estates left at death is a cheering indication of the growth of a salutary change in public opinion. . . . Of all forms of taxation, this seems the wisest. Men who continue hoarding great sums all their lives, the proper use of which for public ends would work good to the community, should be made to feel that the community, in the form of the state, cannot thus be deprived of its proper share. By taxing estates heavily at death, the state marks its condemnation of the selfish millionaire’s unworthy life.

. . . This policy would work powerfully to induce the rich man to attend to the administration of wealth during his life, which is the end that soci- ety should always have in view, as being that by far most fruitful for the people. . . .

There remains, then, only one mode of using great fortunes: but in this way we have the true antidote for the temporary unequal distribution of wealth, the reconciliation of the rich and the poor—a reign of harmony— another ideal, differing, indeed from that of the Communist in requiring only the further evolution of existing conditions, not the total overthrow of

c04.indd 69c04.indd 69 11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM

70 The Gilded Age and Progressive Era

our civilization. It is founded upon the present most intense individualism, and the race is prepared to put it in practice by degrees whenever it pleases. Under its sway we shall have an ideal state, in which the surplus wealth of the few will become, in the best sense, the property of the many, because administered for the common good, and this wealth, passing through the hands of the few, can be made a much more potent force for the elevation of our race than if it had been distributed in small sums to the people them- selves. Even the poorest can be made to see this, and to agree that great sums gathered by some of their fellow -citizens and spent for public purposes, from which the masses reap the principal benefit, are more valuable to them than if scattered among them through the course of many years in trifling amounts.

. . .

This, then, is held to be the duty of the man of Wealth: First, to set an example of modest, unostentatious living, shunning display or extravagance; to provide moderately for the legitimate wants of those dependent upon him; and after doing so to consider all surplus revenues which come to him simply as trust funds, which he is called upon to administer, and strictly bound as a matter of duty to administer in the manner which, in his judgment, is best calculated to produce the most beneficial result for the community—the man of wealth thus becoming the sole agent and trustee for his poorer brethren, bringing to their service his superior wisdom, experience, and ability to administer—doing for them better than they would or could do for themselves.

2 Herbert Spencer, “The Coming Slavery,” 1884 3

Herbert Spencer (1820–1903) was a British journalist and social theorist who coined the term “survival of the fittest” in applying Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theories to human social interaction and whose ideas had an important influence upon Gilded Age American social thought. Andrew Carnegie and William Graham Sumner, among other business leaders of the late nineteenth century, used Spencer’s theory to justify ruthless capitalism.

The following excerpt is from a series of four essays that Spencer wrote in 1884 to expand on and confirm some of the predictions he had made in an article he wrote in 1860. Spencer’s views on the plight of the poor, presented

3 Popular Science Monthly XXIV (April 1884): 721–2.

c04.indd 70c04.indd 70 11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM11/24/2011 3:04:24 PM