Lecture 2: The Transformation of the South and the West, 1877-1917

Goals:
To begin to answer the following question:
1) What major trends reshaped life in the American South
and West in the late 19th century and early 20th
centuries?
To understand the meaning and significance of the following concepts and
terms:
1) Homestead Act of 1862
Gave federally owned land in the west to anyone who claimed the plot of land
for 5 years. Another option was to live on a piece of federal land and then
after six months buy the land at a cheaper price.Few people benefitted.

2) Native American Reservations

3) Sharecropping and Tenant Farming
4) Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
5) Jim Crow
Outline:
I. Introduction
II. The Transformation of the American West
A. The Issue of Perspective
B. The West Before the Civil War
C. Encouraging American Settlement in the West, A Government-Sponsored
Enterprise
1) The Homestead Act of 1862
2) Building the Railroads
3) Warring against Native Americans
a) Native American Reservations
C. Impact on the Western Economy
1) The Case of Farming
III. The Transformation of the American South
A. Reconfiguring the Southern Economy After Slavery
1) Sharecropping and Tenant Farming
B. Reconfiguring Southern Race Relations After Slavery
1) The Road to Racial Segregation
a) Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
2) The Road to Disfranchisement
3) Jim Crow
4) African American Resistance (more on this for next time).
IV. Conclusion
Black Elk, a prominent member of the Oglala Lakota, reflects on the Battle at
Wounded Knee in 1890 at the tail end of the so-called Indian Wars.
“Many were shot down...The women and children ran into the
gulch
and up west, dropping all the time, for the soldiers shot them as
they ran.
There were only about a hundred warriors and there were nearly
five
hundred soldiers....
“It was a good winter day when all this happened. The sun was
shining. But after the soldiers marched away from their dirty
work, a heavy
snow began to fall. The wind came up in the night. There was a
big
blizzard, and it grew very cold. The snow drifted deep into the
crooked
gulch, and it was one long grave of butchered women and
children and
babies, who had never done any harm and were only trying to run
away...
And so it was all over.
I did not know then how much was ended. When I look back now
from this high hill of my old age, I can still see the butchered
women and
children lying heaped and scattered all along the crooked gulch
as plain as
when I saw them with eyes still young. And I can see that
something else
died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A
people’s
dream died there. It was a beautiful dream.
...[Y]ou see me now a pitiful old man who has done nothing, for
the
nation’s hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any
longer, and the
sacred tree is dead.”
Source: John H. Neihardt, Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story
of a Holy
Man of the Oglala Sioux

Lecture 2: The Transformation of the South and the West, 1877-1917

Goals:
To begin to answer the following question:
1) What major trends reshaped life in the American South
and West in the late 19th century and early 20th
centuries?
To understand the meaning and significance of the following concepts and
terms:
1) Homestead Act of 1862
2) Native American Reservations
3) Sharecropping and Tenant Farming
4) Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
5) Jim Crow
Outline:
I. Introduction
II. The Transformation of the American West
A. The Issue of Perspective
B. The West Before the Civil War
C. Encouraging American Settlement in the West, A Government-Sponsored
Enterprise
1) The Homestead Act of 1862: Gave federally owned land in the west to
anyone who claimed the plot of land for 5 years. Another option was to live on
a piece of federal land and then after six months buy the land at a cheaper
price.Few people benefitted.

2) Building the Railroads

Transcontinental Railroad completed in 1869
3) Warring against Native Americans: Government would sign treaties
with natives then go back of them. War would arise. Treaty reaches
cycle continues
a) Native American Reservations
Forced by the US Government to live on. Often small and the least desirable
C. Impact on the Western Economy
Mining industries in the west grew
Cattle Ranching grew

1) The Case of Farming

 Access to railroads allowed farmers to deviate from
subsistence farming and sell crops as transportation
became easier
 Cash crops grew(wheat, barley, etc)
 Farmers life depended on yield and prices
 Crop prices became low as technology improved.
 Railroads charged farmers high fares for goods
transportation.

III. The Transformation of the American South

A. Reconfiguring the Southern Economy After Slavery
1) Sharecropping and Tenant Farming: A sharecropper worked on someone
else’s land in exchange for tools and a share of the harvest. Tenant farmers
often had tools to begin with and had more bargaining power and often got
more of the share of the harvest. Miserable existence. Rarely made enough to
support themselves and often had to trade with merchants for supplies and in
return provide a share of the harvest. Merchants charged high rates of
interest(predatory lenders). If sharecroppers couldn’t pay their debt it would
carry over and accrue more. Sharecroppers often became trapped in this
system of debt and poverty. Included poor whites Most prevalent in the
south but present throughout the country.
B. Reconfiguring Southern Race Relations After Slavery:

Former slaves organized politically; some served in Congress

1) The Road to Racial Segregation

White vigilantes made up of conservative whites terrorized
African Americans and were often prevented from voting,
allowing racist law makers to establish Black Codes
1880s-90s- segregation solidified.
Supreme Court u
a) Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
Homer Plessy boarded a whites only railroad car and was arrested
Supreme Court upheld constitutionality of Segregation provided the
facilities are “equal” in quality.
Facilities were rarely equal in quality.
2) The Road to Disfranchisement
Taking away the right to vote.
KKK and other groups drastically decreased black voting
15th amendment made disenfranchisement more difficult.
Poll taxes, literacy tests,
Conservative southerners felt threatened by the cooperation of poor
whites and blacks.
3) Jim Crow
The system that had taken shape at the turn of the 20th century that
included the segregation and disfranchisement of African American
4) African American Resistance (more on this for next time).
WEB DuBois,
Booker T Washington

IV. Conclusion