The Tariff: real issue or diversion?

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The Tariff real issue or diversion?

• Republicans for it
• Helps manufacturing
• Helps workers keep their jobs

• Democrats against it
• Hurts consumers
• Raises prices on farmers

But the Populists say the tariff debate is just a
diversion from more fundamental issues, such as
regulation of railroads, telegraph, and access to
credit.
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the gendered tariff

• Democrats tariff weakens the autonomy of the
  white male farmer and consumer emasculates him

• Republicans tariff enables male wage earner to
  support his wife, who then can protect the
  domestic hearth

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Grover Cleveland home-wrecker?

• Accused in election of 1884 of having fathered
  illegitimate child
• Cleveland had foraged outside the city Buffalo,
  NY and surrounding villages, a champion
  libertine, an artful seducer, a foe to virtue, an
  enemy of the family, according to one newspaper
• Once in office quickly marries Frances Folsom

Mr. Cleveland on a less successful day of foraging
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1888 Cleveland v. Harrison (r)

• Tariff remains key issue to the campaign
• Harrison wins majority of electoral votes, but
  loses Congress in the election of 1890 to
  Democrats and Populists
• Populists win women support in western states
  with their advocacy of suffrage

Benjamin Harrison reminds me of a pig blinking
in the cold wind. Theodore Roosevelt
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Alliance St. Louis platform, 1889

• Abolition of national banks
• Substitution of money issued by the U.S. Treasury
• Government ownership of railroads and telegraph
• Progressive taxation
• The sub-treasury plan

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Bleeding Kansas, 1854
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Faux populists
Pitchfork Ben Tillman of South Carolina
James Hogg of Texas
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Tom Watson of Georgia
Here is a tenant I do not know, or care,
whether he is white or black. He knows perfectly
well that he cannot get goods as cheap as cash.
The system tears a tenant from his family and
puts him in chains and stripes because he sells
his cotton for something to eat and leaves his
rent unpaid.
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Election of 1892

• Populists elected three governors
• Five U.S. Senators
• Populist presidential candidate gets 1,041,000
  votes
• 8.5 percent of the total vote
• Grover Cleveland (D) defeats Harrison (R) by
  300,000

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Coins Financial School, 1892

• Advocated the unlimited coinage of silver to
  create a more deflationary currency
• Adopted by William Jennings Bryan

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Interstate Commerce Act, 1887

• Shipping rates have to be "reasonable and just"
• Rates must be published
• Secret rebates outlawed
• Price discrimination against small markets
  illegal.

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Sherman Anti-Trust Act, 1890

• Trusts in restraint of trade made illegal
• Punishable by fines of up to 10 million dollars
• Individuals who conspire to monopolize guilty
  of a felony
• Attorney General empowered to enforce the law

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U.S. vs. E.C. Knight Company, 1895

• E.C. Knight produced 98 percent of refined sugar
  in U.S.
• But Supreme Court declared it wasnt violating
  Sherman act because it was involved in
  manufacturing, not trade
• Nyah nyah nyah . . .

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Supreme Court Income tax unconstitutional

• 1895 by 5 to 4 in Pollock v. Farmers Loan
  Supremes say that direct taxes may not be
  imposed directly, unless in proportion to the
  census or enumeration herein before directed to
  be taken. (Section 9, para 4 of Constitution)
• Furthermore Representatives and direct taxes
  shall be apportioned among the several states.
• Court narrowly (5-4) construes this to mean that
  Federal government cant directly collect taxes

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Showdown for the Peoples Party, St. Louis 1896

• Fusionists want to ally with Democrats using
  free silver issue, and endorse William Jennings
  Bryan
• Mid-roaders want to stick to issues like the
  sub-treasury plan
• Bryan says he will not fuse with Peoples Party
  unless they accept pro-gold standard Democrat
  Samuel Sewall as well
• Populists endorse Bryan, with Tom Watson as
  their Vice Presidential candidate

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Bryans 1896 political program

• A graduated Federal income tax
• Direct election of United States Senators
• Greater regulation of the railroads, telegraph,
  and monopolies to protect consumers
• Lower tariffs to protect consumers
• Backing the dollar with silver as well as gold
  for a more flexible currency

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Mark Hanna Mastermind of the McKinley campaign
of 1896
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Frank L. Baum, Wizard of Oz, 1900

• Dorothy average American citizen
• Scarecrow farmer
• Woodman factory worker
• Lion William Jennings Bryan
• Mark Hanna The wizard of OUNCE (aka .OZ)