Download The Populist Crusade

The Populist Crusade
1890s
1. The Agrarian Crusade
A. Causes of Agrarian unrest
1) Social factor - rise of the city
2) Falling prices - cotton, wheat, and corn prices dropped steadily through the 1880s.
3) Rising debts - during a brief boom period in the 19880's. Eastern capitalists
encouraged farmers to borrow money. Farm mortgage indebtedness doubled. In
the South, the crop-lien system had farmers mortgaging crops.
4) Growth of farm tenancy - by 1890 one-fourth of the farmer in Kansas.
B. Farmers response
1) Money supply was no larger in 1890 than it had been in 1865. As debtors,
farmers suffered especially from declining purchasing power of the dollar.
2) Free silver. Since 1973, the country had been on the gold standard. Farmers
demanded the free and un-limited coinage of silver in the ratio of 16:1 (to gold).
2. Election 1896
A. Western discontent
1) Drought conditions
2) Falling prices continued (cotton at .06$ a lb.)
3) Government conservatism
a) Smashing of the Pullman Strike
b) Repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act
c) Passage of high tariffs as seen as support for Wall St.
B. Populist Platform
1) Money (Free Silver)
2) Transportation (railroad regulation)
3) Land
C. Populists joined Democrats in support of William Jennings Bryan .
1) "Cross of Gold “ speech
2) McKinley and the Republicans win easily, smashing the Populist campaign.
Feldmeth, Greg D., "Populist Crusade," U.S. History Resources
<..//gfeldmeth/USHistory.html/lec.precol.html>