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Unit 8 DBQ Review
To what extent was "the Gilded Age” was an age of inaction,
apathy, and extremism in American politics?
Document A
Document B
Pendleton Act of 1883. United States Statutes at Large (47th Cong., Sess. II, Chp. 27,
p. 403-407)
First, for open, competitive examinations for testing the fitness of applicants for the
public service now classified or to be classified hereunder. Such examinations shall be
practical in their character, and so far as may be shall relate to those matters which will
fairly test the relative capacity and fitness of the persons examined to discharge the
duties of the service into which they seek to be appointed.
Second, that all the offices, places, and employments so arranged or to be arranged in
classes shall be filled by selections according to grade from among those graded
highest as the results of such competitive examinations.
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Document C
Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. United States Statutes at Large (49th Cong. Sess II,
Chps 104, p. 379-387)
All charges made for any service rendered or to be rendered in the transportation of
passengers or property as aforesaid, or in connection therewith, or for the receiving,
delivering, storage, or handling of such property, shall be reasonable and just; and every
unjust and unreasonable charge for such service is prohibited and declared to be
unlawful.
Sec. 2. That if any common carrier subject to the provisions of this act shall, directly or
indirectly, by any special rate, rebate, drawback, or other device, charge, demand, collect,
or receive from any person or persons a greater or less compensation for any service
rendered, or to be rendered, in the transportation of passengers or property, subject to the
provisions of this act, than it charges, demands, collects, or receives from any other
person or persons for doing for him or them a like and contemporaneous service in the
transportation of a like kind of traffic under substantially similar circumstances and
conditions, such common carrier shall be deemed guilty of unjust discrimination, which
is hereby prohibited and declared to be unlawful.
Document D
Wabash, St. Louis and Pacific Railroad Company v. Illinois, 1886 Supreme Court
Reporter, 1886, p. 4-23 (118 U.S. 557)
“….. Thus in Munn v. Illinois, 94 U.S. 113, it was decided that a state might regulate
the charges of public warehouses, and, in Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co v. Iowa, Id. 155, of
railroads situate entirely within the state, even though those engaged in commerce
among the states might sometimes use the warehouses or the railroads in the
prosecution of their business.'' After referring to the cases of dams and bridges over
navigable waters, and of turnpikes and ferries, the chief justice continued: ''By such
statutes the states regulate, as a matter of domestic concern, the instruments of
commerce situated wholly within their own jurisdictions, and over which they have
exclusive governmental control, except when employed in interstate commerce. As
they can only be used in the state, their regulation for all purposes may properly be
assumed by the state until congress acts in reference to their foreign or interstate
relations. When congress does act, the state laws are superseded only to the extent
that they affect commerce outside the state as it comes within the state.'' He then
added: ''But we think it may safely be said that state legislation which seeks to
impose a direct burden upon interstate commerce, or to interfere directly with its
freedom, does encroach upon the exclusive power of congress.
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Document E
Document F
President Garfield's First Inaugural Address, 1881, Inaugural Addresses of the
Presidents of the United States, 1789-1963, March 4, 1881.
“Under this Constitution the boundaries of freedom have been enlarged, the
foundations of order and peace have been strengthened, and the growth of our
people in all the better elements of national life has indicated the wisdom of the
founders and given new hope to their descendants. Under this Constitution our
people long ago made themselves safe against danger from without and secured for
their mariners and flag equality of rights on all the seas. Under this Constitution
twenty-five States have been added to the Union, with constitutions and laws,
framed and enforced by their own citizens, to secure the manifold blessings of local
self-government.
The supreme trial of the Constitution came at last under the tremendous
pressure of civil war. We ourselves are witnesses that the Union emerged from the
blood and fire of that conflict purified and made stronger for all the beneficent
purposes of good government.
And now, at the close of this first century of growth, with the inspirations of
its history in their hearts, our people have lately reviewed the condition of the
nation, passed judgment upon the conduct and opinions of political parties, and
have registered their will concerning the future administration of the Government.
To interpret and to execute that will in accordance with the Constitution is the
paramount duty of the Executive.”
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Document G
Document H
Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890. United States Statutes at Large (51st Cong., Sess I,
Chp. 647, p. 209-210)
Sec. 1. Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy,
in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations,
is hereby declared to be illegal. Every person who shall make any such contract or
engage in any such combination or conspiracy, shall be deemed guilty of a
misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by fine not exceeding
five thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding one year, or by both said
punishments, in the discretion of the court.
Sec. 2. Every person who shall monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or combine or
conspire with any other person or persons, to monopolize any part of the trade or
commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed guilty
of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by fine not
exceeding five thousand dollars, or by imprisonment not exceeding one year, or by
both said punishments, in the discretion of the court.
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Document I
“Our agricultural products have been abundant for the last few years. The crops
of cotton, four-fifths of which have been raised by the colored people since the close of
the Rebellion, have been increasing annually in quantity, till that of 1880 was the largest
ever made. Our exports to Europe have taken an annually wide range. . . . . So great have
these exports been for the last few years that the balance of trade has been in our favor on
an average of 150,000,000 dollars a year. For many years the value of our exports has
been many millions in excess of our imports.” Harper’s Weekly, 1881.
Document J
Document K
President McKinley's First Inaugural Address, 1897. Inaugural Addresses of the
Presidents of the United States, 1789-1963. March 4, 1897
The country is suffering from industrial disturbances from which speedy
relief must be had. Our financial system needs some revision; our money is all good
now, but its value must not further be threatened. It should all be put upon an
enduring basis, not subject to easy attack, nor its stability to doubt or dispute. Our
currency should continue under the supervision of the Government. The several
forms of our paper money offer, in my judgment, a constant embarrassment to the
Government and a safe balance in the Treasury. Therefore I believe it necessary to
devise a system which, without diminishing the circulating medium or offering a
premium for its contraction, will present a remedy for those arrangements which,
temporary in their nature, might well in the years of our prosperity have been
displaced by wiser provisions.
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Document L
Independent 36, no. 16 (October 30, 1884).
“Some of Mr. Cleveland's supporters try to comfort themselves with the idea
that the offense charged against him, being a delinquency in his private life, has
nothing to do with the question of his fitness or unfitness for the Presidency.
Though his morals in this respect may be bad, he may, nevertheless, be trusted with
the duties of the office. . . .
The plain truth is that licentiousness is one of the very worst of vices, that a
man's real character is the one shown by his private life, and that this is the
character which he will carry with him into his public life, if elected thereto. The
connection between the two lives is direct and intimate; and, hence, no one who is
bad in his private character is fit to be trusted with public duties.
No decent man surely would think of voting for a horse-thief; and, for an
equally good reason, no one should vote for the lecherous corrupter of womanhood.
Both are essentially rotten at the seat of moral life. It is bad enough to have them in
private life, and will be much worse to have them in public life, especially when the
latter would carry with it the virtual acceptance and endorsement of a gross
immorality. A nation that, with its eyes open, will select a libertine for its chief
magistrate must be in the worst stage of moral decay.”
Document M
The People's Party Platform, 1892
“We meet in the midst of a nation brought to the verge of moral, political and
material ruin. Corruption dominates the ballot box, the Legislatures, the Congress, and
touches even the ermine of the bench. The people are demoralized; most of the States
have been compelled to isolate the voters at the polling places to prevent universal
intimidation or bribery. The newspapers are largely subsidized or muzzled, public
opinion silenced, business prostrated, our homes covered with mortgages, labor
impoverished, and the land concentrating in the hands of the capitalists. The urban
workmen are denied the right of organization for self-protection; imported pauperized
labor beats down their wages; a hireling standing army…..
We have witnessed, for more than a quarter of a century, the struggles of the
two great political parties for power and plunder, while grievous wrongs have been
inflicted upon the suffering people. We charge that the controlling influences
dominating both these parties have permitted the existing dreadful conditions to
develop without serious effort to prevent or restrain them.
[The old Parties]Neither do they now promise us any substantial reform. They
have agreed together to ignore, in the coming campaign, every issue but one. They
propose to drown the outcries of a plundered people with the uproar of a sham battle over
the tariff, so that capitalists, corporations, national banks, rings, trusts, watered stock, the
demonetization of silver and the oppressions of the usurers may all be lost sight of. They
propose to sacrifice our homes, lives and children, on the altar of mammon; to destroy the
multitude in order to secure corruption funds from the millionaires.”