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Gilded Age Dbq Analysis

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During the Gilded Age (1870-1900), workers faced numerous problems in which they attempted to fix through organizing into labor unions. But, these unions failed. Their overall goals were to have better wages and working conditions, but a shorter work day in which they did not achieve. (Document A1) The government was corrupted and controlled by big business, which caused a lack of good interpretation, regulation, and passing of progressive legislations. Big businesses also had control over the media which lead to reports in newspapers to give the reader a negative view on labor unions. Labor unions needed skilled workers to have leverage in collective bargaining, but steadily improving technologies replaced many skilled workers. To prevent …show more content…

Thus, Pinkertons, police or military would be sent to the location where more violence would cause many injuries, some possibly fatal. (Document G1) Labor unions would always be blamed for these fights, even if they had not instigated it, and so the public thought unions were violent and reckless. These strikes were made illegal due to them never being peaceful (Document H2) On top of that, many labor unions were said to be connected to communism and socialism. Many believed the unions were a threat to capitalism and the United States which terrified the public. (Document F2) To combat these opinions, Samuel Gompers, the founder of the American Federation of Labor, made a statement to show that he and his union were pro capitalism, not socialism. “Economically, you (socialists) are unsound; socially, you are wrong; and industrially you are an impossibility.” (Document G2) But this did not eliminate the bad image of labor …show more content…

A yellow dog contact would require the worker to avoid all labor unions to get or maintain their job which lead to a decrease in union members. (Document E1) Without many members, unions would lose their leverage of strength in numbers. In the Homestead Strike and Lockout of 1892, Andrew Carnegie, the owner of Carnegie Steel, hired Pinkertons. These spies would become part of the union, and discover if they wanted to do a sit in strike. This could have caused lots of damage to Carnegie’s factory, and so he locked out the workers the next day. The workers went home and then returned with weapons and fight with the Pinkertons. Numerous people were killed. (Document G1) Many owners and managements saw their workers as the equivalent of machines. “So as long as they do my work for what I choose to pay them, I keep them…” (Document A2) Management’s could easily fire and replace their workers with scabs, who were immigrants. Scabs would do the same amount of work for a lesser pay which lead to more native workers being fired, and less members in the labor unions. Losing the leverage that the number of members provided would become a tremendous problem for workers and labor

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The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911 was the deadliest workplace accident in New York history. Most of the workers in the factory were immigrants who came to America for a better future. Their dream was economic security, which they saw in America. Getting a job in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory was a desired position, even if the job consisted of fourteen hour work days, six days a week. At most, the workers would take home $2 a day.

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There are many simmaleritys and differences between the Knights of labor and the AFL this will explain only a few. The Knights were established in 1869 vs the AFL established in 1886 a few years later. This means the Knights are the predisesors of the AFL. Some made compromises others started boycotts, and the following explanes all. Both the AFL and the Knights had labor unions involved with them.

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In the face of power of big business and the face of the federal government, the laboring-class Americans attempted to better their lives. The laboring-class did that by improving work conditions, decreasing poverty, and trying to get increased government interactions. The laboring-class attempted to improve working conditions. Working conditions were very poor.

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An excerpt from Gilded Age tells us how companies are greedy and corrupted by charging hidden fees and finding a way not to pay their workers. It also shows how companies did not take contracts to their workers seriously. (Doc 2) If the Federal Government was more involved with how business men did their work; there wouldn’t have been so much deceitfulness toward the workers from the employers. The Federal Government could have put efforts into regulating pay for employees and making sure the companies stuck to their word about any benefits.

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Corporate greedy and corrupt politicians were specific problems and injustices that were present in American life during the late 1800s and early 1900s however these were addressed during the progressive era with laws and regulations. Throughout the gilded era corrupt politicians and corporate greedy allowed the upper class and businessmen to take advantage of the working class. This means that a majority of the population were hurt during the gilded age whereas a small percentage benefitted. As seen in document 1, living conditions were crowded, dirty, and unsafe.

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The organized labor of 1875-1900 was unsuccessful in proving the position of workers because of the future strikes, and the intrinsical feeling of preponderation of employers over employees and the lack of regime support. In 1877, railroad work across the country took part in a cyclopean strike that resulted in mass violence and very few reforms. An editorial, from the Incipient York Time verbalized: "the strike is ostensibly hopeless, and must be regarded as nothing more than a rash and splenetic demonstration of resentment by men too incognizant or too temerarious to understand their own interest" (Document B). In 1892, workers at the Homestead steel plant near Pittsburg ambulated out on strike and mass chaos the lives of at least two Pinkerton detectives and one civilian, among many other laborers death (Document G).

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Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation Union from the late 19th century to the early 20th century wrote a letter in the American Federationist for the labor unions in 1894.In 1900 N.F Thompson made the argument against labor unions in a testimony before the Industrial Commission on the Relations and Conditions of Capital and Labor. In a small excerpt of his testimony he wrote believed that to recognize such a power as this is any [labor union], or to permit such a theory to be advanced without protest or counteracting influence, is so dangerous and subversive of

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