52.

THE HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF THE UNITED STATES: FROM ABRAHAM

LINCOLN TO FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT.

This presentation covers US history from the presidency of Abraham Lincoln

(1861-1865), to the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933-45). Appropriately
referred to as a period of “historical evolution”, the 80-years covered by this topic will
show how a country torn by civil war in 1865, evolved to become by 1945 the world’s
most powerful and affluent nation. I will divide the topic into three different sections. In
my first section I will deal with the years after the Civil War, the so-called reconstruction
period. In my second section I will deal with the period between 1870 and 1900. I will
have a look at aspects such as the industrial growth, the economic expansion and
immigration. Finally, my last section will be devoted to the period between 1900 and
1945.
Before I go any further, however, I would like to say that to write this essay, I have
consulted the following works:
The Encyclopaedia Britannica,
James Joll's book, Europe since 1870: An International History, published in 1990.

I will begin this discussion with the government of Abraham Lincoln, post civil war,
and the attempt to reconstruct the union. On March 1861 Abraham Lincoln took the
oath of office as President of the US. Less than a month had passed since eleven
southern states had announced that they were an independent nation, the Confederate
States of America, often known as the Confederacy, because of their differences with
the northern states. The main of these differences was related to the question of slavery,
which the south rejected to abolish. April saw the beginning of the American Civil War.
Despite the initial supremacy of the north, the war went on for four years. In April 1865
the south finally surrendered.
The Civil War gave final answers to two questions that had divided the US ever
since it became an independent nation. It put an end to slavery. In 1865 this was
abolished everywhere in the US by the 13 th Amendment to Constitution. And it decided

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finally that the US was one nation, whose parts could not be separated. But the war left
bitter memories. It had caused terrible destruction. All over the South cities and farm lay
in ruins. And more Americans died in this war than in any other, before or since.

Following the American Civil War, the major problems that arose for Lincoln’s
government was Reconstruction: how to confederate the 11 states into the so-called
United States. The assassination of 1Lincoln three days after the end of the war did not
alter this policy regarding reconstruction due to the fact that the former vice president,
Andrew Johnson, a southerner continued Lincoln’s moderate policies. The years of
reconstruction were marked by debates between north and south over the issue of
blacks, still not gone away with the end of the Civil War. Johnson began to introduce
plans to reunite the South with the rest of the nation. As soon as the seceded states
promised to be loyal to the government of the US, they were allowed to elect new
assemblies to run their affairs.

Some of the worst incidents of race problems ever seen in the states occurred
during this time. White southerners were especially horrified at the idea of giving equal
rights to their former black slaves. Most southern assemblies passed laws to keep
blacks in an inferior position. Such laws were called “black codes”. Black codes refused
blacks the vote, said they could not serve on juries and forbade them to give evidence
against a white man in court. In some states blacks were not allowed even to rent a
farm. With no land, no money and no protection it was almost as if blacks were still
slaves. Determined to deal with the “Southern” problem, the Republicans won the
election in 1866 and began a period known as the “Radical Reconstruction”. It was
during this period that some of the important civil rights legislation in US history was
passed: the famous fourteenth Amendment (June 1866), which gave blacks full rights of
citizenship, even the right to vote.

1
Let us remember how beloved Lincoln was; after being assassinated, the poet Walt Whitman dedicated a poem to
Lincoln, the famous “O Captain! my Captain!”

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 Most of the former Confederate states refused to accept the 14 th Amendment.
Congress replied by passing the Reconstruction Act. This dismissed the white
governments of the southern states and placed them under military rule. They were told
that they could again have elected governments when they accepted the 14 th
Amendment and gave black men the vote. By 1870 all the southern states had
“Reconstruction” governments. Most were made up of blacks, a few white southerners
who were willing to work with them and white men from the North.

Most white southerners supported the Democratic political party. These southern
democrats claimed that the Reconstruction governments were incompetent and
dishonest. Southern whites organized terrorist groups to make white men the masters
once more. The main aim of these groups was to threaten and frighten black people and
prevent them from claiming their rights. The largest and most feared terrorist group was
a secret society called the Ku Klux Klan. Its members beat and killed any black who tried
to improve his position.

This use of violence helped white racists to win back control all over the South.
When Congress withdrew federal troops from the South in 1877, white Democrats won
control of southern states. Reconstruction was over. All southern states passed laws to
enforce strict racial segregation, which was imposed on trains, parks, schools,
restaurants and even cemeteries.

The depression continued throughout the South, affecting both white and black
alike by 1890, the south ranked the lowest in every sector, they had the lowest capita
income, lowest public health system and lowest education. These relations remained an
issue in American history till the 1960s. However, Post-Civil War America was an
expanding nation and it is a period marked by rapid industrialization due to the
expansions to the west and by the massive influx of foreign immigrants.

After dealing with the reconstruction years, I am going to deal with the period
between 1870 and 1900. From the late 1870s until the turn of the century, America

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entered a rapid phase of industrialization, for example the annual production of steel
rose ten times, surpassing Great Britain in output and materials. This period was also
known as “the years of growth”. There are numerous associated factors to this rapid
industrialization. The main factor was the exploitation of natural resources and raw
materials, which created new industrial demands. These years of growth were
characterized by:
 The gold rush: After a group of men found golden specks
glittering in the water of a stream in California, tons of people hurried to the
gold fields to make themselves rich, rising the population massively. The first
mining settlements were just a few tents and huts, but with time some grew
later into permanent communities extended all over the far west.
 The Railroads: They played an important role joining the gold-rich
settlements along the Pacific Coast to the rest of the United States. The
Congress had become anxious with this idea and in 1862 it granted land and
money to the Union Pacific Railroad Company to build a railroad west from
the Mississippi towards the Pacific; at the same time, the Congress gave a
similar grant to the Central Pacific Railroad Company to build eastwards from
California. Both companies moved forward as fast as they could, for the
grants of land and money promised. In 1869 both lines met at Utah and the
first railroad across the North American continent was completed.
 The Cattlemen: As the railroads pushed west, cattle ranchers in
Texas saw a way to make money. They could feed cattle cheaply on the
grasslands between the Mississippi and the Rockies. In the years after the
Civil War, Texas cattle owners hired men called “cowboys” to drive their cattle
north to the railroad. Many of these cowboys were confederate soldiers who
had moved west after the Civil War. Very soon meat from the west was
feeding people in Europe as well as the eastern side of the States.
 The farming of the Great Plains (the West): In 1862, while the Civil
War was still on, the Congress passed a law that had nothing to do with the
war: The Homestead Act, which offered free farms in the West to families of

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 settlers, the so-called “homesteaders” to work on for five years and then they
would belong to them; even immigrants were given land. For many years,
living there was not easy, plagues of insects caused a lot of destruction; some
abandoned, but most stayed and gradually they overcame the difficulties.

Another factor was series of major inventions: In the Great Plains for instance,
homesteaders and cowboys complained because the former were blocking the cattle
trails, whereas the latter said their ploughed fields and crops were eaten by the
ranchers’ cattle. At this time (1874) a farmer in Illinois patented an invention: the “barbed
wire” which consisted of two strands of plain wire twisted around one another to fence
the lands, with this, the problem was solved.

Like the barbed wire, the sewing machine and the telephone were other
innovations, although it was the invention of the electric light bulb which caused a
revolution. Created by Thomas Edison in1878, it spread all over the country producing
light; with time, Edison formed the Electric Light Company producing electricity not only
in the streets but also heating houses, giving power to machines etc. In the same way
as Edison, Henry Ford started to make automobiles by means of assembly lines.

All these inventions became the basis for a whole host of new industries;
industries started to disperse geographically. The iron and steel industry was
concentrated in the area of Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Ohio, whereas the
Midwest was associated with agriculture related to industries; the south, unsurprisingly,
continued in the domain of textiles and cotton mills, which became the symbol of the
new south running from Virginia to Georgia and into Alabama.

As America was turning itself into an industrializing nation, new trends took place
like for instance an urban shift of the population as well as the establishment of new
labour organizations and new forms of trade. In many European countries, industrial
expansion brought an urban movement from rural areas into the towns and cities of the
US. From 1880 to 1900 the population of the US almost doubled, setting the emergence

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of a society based on a growing industrialized foundation. On the other hand, national
and foreign trade also increased substantially during this time. The value of exports from
the United States was steadily rising throughout the period. US exports were agricultural
goods: cotton, wheat, flour and meat products, although at the end of the century,
manufactured goods and machinery were becoming more significant in number.

Together with the growth of industrialization and urban life, there was a rise of
national trade unionism, as workers attempted to obtain better pay and working
conditions. In addition, the period was also marked by strikes and outbreaks of violence
from time to time. In the same way, with industrialization and expanding business
opportunities, one trend became common: American magnates. The most famous name
often associated with this is perhaps Rockefeller, who helped setting up the Standard Oil
Trust. The giant industrial organizations that such men created were known as
corporations. As they grew bigger and more powerful still, they often became trusts. The
Trust was an organization where the voting rights of a controlling number of 2shares
from some competing companies were under the control of a small group of powerful
men. Their aim was to discourage competition between companies, by rising prices to
ensure benefits. For many years (by 1890) trusts were all over in the industries of
whisky, lead, cottonseed oil and salt. The bigger trusts were richer than most nations.
Today, the term “trust” in a business sense in the US is used for any “monopoly-type
practice”.

Many Americans were alarmed by the power of the trusts, as the country was
coming under the control of a handful of rich and powerful men. Industrialization also
brought about a government response. Towards the end of the century, the congress
focused increasingly on monopolistic practices, and passed many acts to declare any
practices which restricted national or foreign trade illegal; it was also during this time that
the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) was established, with widely authority to prevent
business practices that would lead to a monopoly.

2
Meaning “acciones”, las acciones de una compañía.

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 Let us talk about US expansion. In post Civil War America, there was a continuing
westward movement from 1880 to 1900. Encouraged west in the hope of good land still
open to settlement and the expanding railroads, new states were added to the Union
throughout the century, and by 1900, only 3 territories: Oklahoma, Arizona and New
Mexico were still to be made into the states.

Apart from this expansion, in the period leading up to the end of the century, the
US underwent a massive population increase, due to the large number of immigrants
from northern or western Europe. The story of the American people is a story of
immigrants. More than 75 per cent of all the people in history who have ever left their
homelands to live in another country have moved to the US. For millions of these
immigrants the Statue of Liberty of New York was the first sight of America. Referred to
as “the Golden Door”, the Statue of Liberty was presented to the United States in 1886
by France to mark the hundredth anniversary of the War of Independence. The Statue
was, and is still located on a small island in New York harbour. So many immigrants
wanted to enter the US in the late 1800s that the government found it difficult to keep
check on them. A special place was opened in New York harbour, and was called Ellis
Island, which in the 1800s served as a place to examine medically and psychologically
all the immigrants entering the states. Today, Ellis Island is one of the most visited
museums of New York City. To finish with immigration, it is worthwhile mentioning a
concept which describes the past and present history of the US: the concept of Melting
Pot. This concept first appeared in 1908 in a play named like that. This work dealt with a
Russian refugee escaping to the States from persecution and it deals with the mixture of
races. Together with Melting Pot, some people talk today about Salad Bowl by saying
that groups from similar national and ethnic backgrounds often stayed together and did
not mix completely. That is why, even today, when visiting large cities like New York or
Chicago one may still find districts called “China Towns” or “Little Italy”.

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 I am going to move on to my last section, dealing with the period between
1900 and 1945. By 1900 the US was the richest and most productive industrial country
in the world, but the conditions for the workers were not good. Wages were very low.
Americans were not complacent about conditions in their country. Many Americans
became Progressives: a progressive was someone who believed that, when necessary,
the government should take action to deal with the problems of society. The Progressive
movement found a leader in Theodore Roosevelt, who became President in 1901. The
next president, Wilson, shared some of his ideas. He tried to reduce the power of trusts,
gave more rights to trade unions and made it easier for farmers to borrow money from
the federal government to develop their land.

The US, despite trying to avoid World War I, ended up declaring war on
Germany. After the war, the 1920s, the roaring twenties, were years of great wealth, as
many countries owed the US a lot of money. There was an amazing growth of industry
and ordinary people enjoyed easier and more comfortable life. But there were lots of
poor Americans. In the south there were still thousands of poor farmers (blacks and
whites) working from sunrise to sunset to earn barely enough to live on.

Unfortunately for Americans, the end of the 1920s saw one of the blackest
periods in American economic and social history. Despite a period of prosperity, the
economic situation deteriorated in the 1920s, culminating in the Stock Market Crash of
1929, causing the Great Depression. The profits being made by many American forms
had been decreasing for some time. Share prices also fall, as people began to sell them.
A panic began. The fall became faster and thousands of people found themselves facing
debt and ruin. Within 3 years of the crash, share prices were one quarter of their
original value and industrial production soon suffered drastically leading to the worst
unemployment the States had ever seen (By 1933 at least one out of four workforce was
unemployed). In addition, when the bad economic situation in Europe led to the non-
payment of debt reparations to the States, the US entered a deeper crisis.

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 The president Herbert Hoover started a series of emergency policies to help
the economy. However, it is with the new president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, that the
best-known policy is associated: The New Deal. When Roosevelt took office as
president, he was faced with one of the worst banking crisis that had forced some states
to suspend banking activities. Roosevelt acted quickly to restore public confidence and
emergency banking bill; he submitted his policy on March 1933 and it was successful
with little more than a week. In the long-term, the New Deal involved complex policies
and institutions created in order to solve some of the most fundamental economic and
social issues created by the Great Depression. The New Deal touched every area of
economic and social life in the US like: the restructuration of the Banking system, the
regulation of Trade, benefits to unemployed workers, Social Security providing relief to
aged, retired, disabled, unemployed people; improvement of Labour Relations by giving
workers´ organizations more power, Mortgage Relief etc. However, economic historians
today review the New Deal with mixed blessings. Some say the deal fought off
depression, while in terms of agriculture it is said to have failed since large operators
benefited largely more than small family farmers. In terms of recovery, it did not solve
the problems fully and it was not until the Second World War that economic renewal and
full employment were really to take place.

By 1939, despite the New Deal, ten million American workers had no jobs. When
Second Wold War began, the US became the main supplier of weapons to the countries
fighting Hitler. In 1941 the US joined the war itself and unemployment disappeared. A
few weeks before the end of the war President Roosevelt died. The New Deal was over,
but most Americans were better off than they had been in the days of the Depression.
Roosevelt taught the Americans to look to the government to see that everyone had a
fair chance to obtain what he called “the good things of life”. Many Americans still
remember him with respect and affection.

To sum up, in this topic I have dealt with the historical evolution of the United
States of America in a period marked by two extremely significant presidents: Abraham
Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Throughout the 80 years covered by this topic, we

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have studied the reconstruction attempts following the American Civil War and how after
industrialization, the country expanded and witnessed the huge arrival of immigrants.
However, in the 1930s after the Stock Market crash in 1929, the US faced the years of
the Great Depression; during these years, America saw itself in the blackest of its
periods, the economy was deteriorated and unemployment affected one quarter of the
population. However, in 1933 with the arrival of Roosevelt as a president and his famous
New Deal, American recovered in the long run although this aspect is seen within
different perspectives by economic historians. Little by little America recovered itself
emerging as what it is today: a World Leader.

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