HIST 2013 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Gilded Age, Electoral Fraud, Mckinley Tariff
10 Sep 2016
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Lesson 4: the gilded age- politics week 3. Gerrymandering: to divide a territorial unit into election districts to give one political party an electoral majority in a large number of districts while concentrating the voting strength of the opposition in as few districts as possible. Spoil-system or patronage system ruled most politics. Rewarding campaign contributors with cushy government jobs. Don"t actually have ability to do the job. Everyone did it, wasn"t seen as bad. Big corporations have a lot of power over government. Bribe government official to help keep monopolies. Most corrupt political era in us history. Parties were pretty evenly matched (especially on the federal level) Republicans usually control senate, executive, and judiciary, the democrats control the house. Republicans controlled the senate, the executive, and the house. First time the government spent 1 billion dollars. Third parties: prohibition, greenback, labor, populist, etc. In this time only businesses could really lobby the government.
