African Americans In The Progressive Era

Allan Radinsky

Mrs. Thompson

1877-Present

2/22/2017

The Progressive Era During 1877-1920 the south was not characterized as racial equality. There are many examples of why. One example being white terrorist groups. One specific terrorist group was the Klu Klux Klan. The Klu Klux Klan however didn’t just go after African Americans, but also immigrants. The Irish, Germans, and the Chinese. The artist depicted the KKK walking on Washington to show how much support it had (Klan Walk on Washington). White southerners saw each of these race groups as inferior and a plague to the society. However, for the African Americans the white southerners mainly targeted them. African Americans received the grandfather clause. This was first tested out in Louisiana.

Actually many Americans lived in harsh conditions, and many worked in extremely dangerous conditions. For example, during the building of railroads there are two major rail road’s being built by two major companies. The Union Pacific and the Central Pacific. For the Union Pacific railroad workers, it was mainly constructed by Irish immigrants as well as African Americans, ex-confederate soldiers, and union soldiers. One of the main slogans was “An Irishman buried under every tie” due to how harsh the conditions were for the Union Pacific workers. In order to get the railroad down they had to cut down trees, dig ditches, and lay down track. They were also extremely under paid for the labor and the harsh conditions they had to deal with. As for the Central Pacific it was mainly constructed by Chinese worker’s. The conditions were also just as bad. The Central Pacific workers had to blast through mountains with dynamite and had to deal with avalanches from snow storms. Had to build bridges, live within labor camps and had extremely poor wages. The railroad culture was considered to truly be “Hell on Wheels”. Specifically, because of all the drinking, gambling and prostitution, and for the Chinese opium was

From buying Alaska from Russia, to annexing territories and taking over Hawaii and making Hawaii and Alaska states of the United States. The United States used imperialism. The United States wanted to as stated to expand further than the forty-eight states at the time. As the artist illustrates in the picture of America conquering land (American Imperialism). During the American Spanish war. The United States wanted to take advantage of the Caribbean for example Cuba. At the time Cuba wanted its independence from Spain. The United States wanted to keep their sugar and mining companies in Cuba. Now the Cubans used two fellow yellow journalists, known as William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer. The two both wrote about how the Spanish atrocities in Cuba, many were fabricated. Hearst and Pulitzer manipulated public opinion in order to have the American people intervene.

The U.S.S. Maine was located in the Havana harbor two hundred and sixty sailors died due to the explosion. This gave the American government exactly what they needed in order to go into cube. They came up with the slogan “Remember the Maine to Hell with Spain.” As a result the United States sent troops to Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. The United States annexed Puerto Rico as a U.S