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READING THE AMERICAN PAST FIFTH EDITION

Selected Historical Documents Volume 2: From 1865

MICHAEL P. JOHNSON Johns Hopkins University

Bedford/St. Martin’s Boston ◆ New York

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For Bedford/St. Martin’s

Publisher for History: Mary Dougherty Executive Editor for History: William J. Lombardo Director for Development for History: Jane Knetzger Developmental Editor: Jennifer Jovin Assistant Production Manager: Joe Ford Senior Marketing Manager for U.S. History: Amy Whitaker Project Management: DeMasi Design and Publishing Services Permissions Manager: Kalina K. Ingham Cover Designer: Billy Boardman Cover Art: Gulf War Troops in Parade, Troops walk down the “Canyon Of Heroes,”

on Broadway, in Manhattan, as part of their welcome home parade. June 10, 1991. © Najlah Feanny/CORBIS SABA.

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Copyright © 2012, 2009, 2005, 2002 by Bedford/St. Martin’s

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, pho- tocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as may be expressly permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in writing by the Publisher.

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For information, write: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 75 Arlington Street, Boston, MA 02116 (617-399-4000)

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Acknowledgments Acknowledgments and copyrights appear at the back of the book on pages 341–42, which constitute an extension of the copyright page.

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iii

Preface for Instructors

R eading the American Past is a collection of compelling documents that represent political, social, and cultural experiences critical to students’ understanding of the scope and diversity of United States history. Created by people who shaped American history in ways both large and small, these primary sources reveal the views of the au- thors, the historical context in which they were written, and the major developments and controversies of their era. The documents give depth, breadth, and variety to textbook discussions of important developments in our nation’s past. Organized chapter by chapter to parallel The Amer- ican Promise: A History of the United States in all its editions — full-length, value, compact, and brief, this wide-ranging set of documents offers teach- ers many pedagogical choices for discussion, analysis, writing assignments, and examinations. Above all, Reading the American Past seeks to ignite the sparks of historical imagination that every teacher hopes to see in stu- dents’ eyes.

Reading a textbook discussion of Columbus’s arrival in the New World, for example, gives students basic, up-to-date information that has been collected, sorted out, and synthesized over the past fi ve hundred years. But reading the words Columbus wrote in his log shortly after he stepped ashore in the Western Hemisphere recaptures as no textbook can that moment of profound, mutual surprise when fi fteenth-century Euro- peans and the people they called Indians fi rst encountered one another. As every historian knows, primary sources bridge the gap from the pres- ent, when they are read, to the past, when they were written. They encour- age students to venture across that span connecting present and past and to risk discovering a captivating and unexpected world.

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iv READING THE AMERICAN PAST

FEATURES OF THIS BOOK Three basic principles guided my selection of documents. First and fore- most, the sources highlight major events and signifi cant perspectives of a given historical era. Second, I chose and edited documents to be acces- sible, interesting, and often surprising to students. Third, I sought sources that lend themselves to analysis in classroom discussion and writing assignments — documents that vividly portray controversies marking a particular historical moment and that offer multiple avenues of interpre- tation.

User-friendly editorial features help students read and interpret the sources. Introductory headnotes and follow-up questions to aid students’ reading and discussion accompany each document. Unfamiliar words are defi ned when they are necessary to understand a document. Editorial intrusions have been kept brief, providing just enough information to allow students to explore the sources and make their own discoveries. By minimizing editorial interventions, I hope to encourage students to focus on the documents and to become astonished, perplexed, and invigorated by what they read.

Documents new to the fi fth edition. This new edition incorporates the insights and suggestions of teachers who have used Reading the American Past. Guided by their classroom experiences, I have replaced one docu- ment per chapter (and two in the last chapter) in order to diversify the historical voices from each era and to give students and teachers fresh choices for investigating major developments.

In all, thirty-two new documents provide greater attention to the global context of American history, as well as offer more coverage of the viewpoints of ordinary Americans — women and men, immigrants and natives, minorities and majorities, workers and bosses. A Native Ameri- can participant in the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 in New Mexico explains why it happened (Document 3–5). A woman captured by the Seneca during the Seven Years’ War describes her life in captivity (Document 6–1). A South Carolina planter’s wife reports her encounters with slave women on her husband’s rice plantation (Document 13–3). A homesteader’s wife de- scribes her new life on the Nebraskan prairie (Document 17–2). A suffrag- ist ridicules arguments used by opponents of voting by women (Document 21–4). A Vietnam veteran denounces the Vietnam War (Document 29–5). And many more.

Diverse perspectives and sources. The documents assembled here pro- vide students a generous cross-section of the diverse experiences that comprise the American past. The refl ections of politicians and thieves, generals and privates, reformers and reprobates can be found here, along with those of the nation’s countless ethnic and religious minorities. Barack Obama’s 2010 speech in Cairo (Document 31–5) joins classic sources such

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PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS v

as John Winthrop’s Arbella sermon (Document 4–1), George Washington’s Farewell Address (Document 9–5), and George Kennan’s “Long Tele- gram” (Document 26–2), which disclose the perspectives of infl uential leaders. The no-less-signifi cant views of common people are revealed by such documents as the memoir of an En glishwoman who became an indentured servant in eighteenth-century New York (Document 5–1), the letter from a slave to President Thomas Jefferson demanding that the president live up to his criticisms of slav ery (Document 10–3), twentieth- century letters from American soldiers at war (Documents 22–3 and 25–4), and an interview with a Mexican American migrant farmworker (Docu- ment 24–4). Diaries and court cases convey the immediacy of history as lived experience. Reminiscences and oral histories illuminate the past with memories of participants. Speeches, manifestos, congressional testimony, and White House tape recordings spotlight the ends and means of politi- cal power. Essays, addresses, and passages from books offer the consid- ered opinions of cultural leaders, whether captains of industry, novelists, or social critics.

Classroom fl exibility. The selections in Reading the American Past allow instructors to choose documents that best serve their teaching needs. Teachers might, for example, ask students to read documents in prep ara- tion for lectures, then refer to the assigned selections as they explain, say, the encounter between Europeans and Native Americans, the tensions that led to the Civil War, or the origins and consequences of the Cold War. An instructor might devote a class to explicating a single source, such as Richard Frethorne’s letter describing his life as an indentured servant at Jamestown, Virginia (Document 3–1), or Walter Wyckoff’s observations about socialists and anarchists in 1890s Chicago (Document 19–4), or Joseph Stiglitz’s article that blamed the economic meltdown of 2008 on the dereg- ulation of the fi nancial system since the Reagan years (Document 31–4).

All the documents are ideally suited for provoking discussions dur- ing lecture sessions or in section meetings. Students can be asked to adopt and defend the viewpoint of a given source, to attack it from the perspec- tive of a historical contemporary, to dissect its assumptions and evasions, or to compare and contrast it with other sources. Selections might also be used for quizzes, brief writing assignments, longer papers, or examina- tions. The documents open these and many other avenues for inspiring students to investigate the American past.

Tips for reading documents. A short introduction for students at the out- set of each volume explains the signifi cance of documents for understand- ing history and outlines the basic questions that students should ask themselves in order to decipher any primary source. It encourages stu- dents to consider the historical context, author, date, audience, and lan- guage of the sources they are about to read.

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vi READING THE AMERICAN PAST

Just the right amount of context. A brief paragraph begins each chapter, setting the documents in the larger historical context detailed in the corresponding chapter of the textbook. A headnote precedes every docu- ment, identifying its source, explaining when and by whom it was pro- duced, and highlighting why it presents a revealing point of view. Rather than cluttering documents with numerous explanatory notes, I have assumed that students will — and they should — refer to a textbook for basic information about the people and events that appear in the sources, though notes are provided for more obscure words and people.

Thought-provoking questions. To guide students toward key passages and central ideas, “Questions for Reading and Discussion” follow each document. They are intended to help students identify fundamental points, analyze what a document means, and think about its larger histori- cal signifi cance. “Comparative Questions” at the end of each chapter ask students to ponder some of the similarities and differences among the chapter’s documents, and to consider how the ideas, observations, and viewpoints expressed reveal the major historical developments of the time.

To see more clearly along the many angles of historical vision offered by the documents, students rely on the guidance, insight, and wisdom of their teachers. Reading the American Past gives instructors numerous oppor- tunities to entice students to become active collaborators in the study of American history. Ideally, these documents will help persuade students that the American past is neither frozen in time nor entombed in books, but instead shapes their present and prefi gures their future. Ideally, they will come to see that they do not simply read American history; they live it.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS For help with this edition of Reading the American Past I am indebted to many people, but to none more than the following historians who have shared their professional insights and classroom experiences to suggest ways to make the documents more useful and informative for students and teachers throughout the country: James Barrera, South Texas College; Kevin Brown, Lansing Community College; Tonia M. Compton, Colum- bia College; Luke E. Harlow, Oakland University; Matthew Harper, Uni- versity of Central Arkansas; Diana K. Honey, Kennesaw State University; Arlene Lazarowitz, Cal i fornia State University, Long Beach; Matthew Mason, Brigham Young University; Brian Jeffrey Maxson, East Tennessee State University; Suzanne L. McFadden, Austin Community College; Sandy Moats, University of Wisconsin-Parkside; Jeffrey P. Moran, Univer- sity of Kansas; Maureen Murphy Nutting, North Seattle Community Col- lege; Robert O’Brien, Lone Star College-CyFair; Thomas Sabatini, Kent State University at Trumbull; Donald J. Schwegler, SUNY Orange; Jeffrey

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PREFACE FOR INSTRUCTORS vii

Smith, Lindenwood University; Judith Spraul-Schmidt, University of Cin- cinnati; T.J. Tomlin, University of Northern Colorado; and Janet A. Wiita, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

I have also relied, as usual, on my coauthors of The American Promise — James L. Roark, Patricia Cline Cohen, Sarah Stage, and Susan M. Hart- mann — for advice and suggestions. Although I have benefi ted from the support of all of these colleagues, I am nonetheless solely responsible for the fi nal selection of documents and edited passages in this volume.

Many others contributed their energy and creativity to this project. From the outset, Joan Feinberg and Chuck Christensen have enthusi- astically supported the publication of a collection of American history documents that aspired to the high standards readers have come to expect from Bedford/St. Martin’s. As always, Mary Dougherty, Bill Lombardo, and Jane Knetzger brought their benevolent and constructive steward- ship to the project. Jennifer Jovin combined enthusiasm and good edito- rial judgment to digest reviewers’ comments and improve this edition throughout. Andrea Cava, Joe Ford, and Linda DeMasi skillfully steered the book through the production process, while Kalina Ingham and Caro- lyn Evans handled permissions.

Overall, this book represents the constructive efforts of teachers, stu- dents, colleagues, editors, and publishers, all enlisted in the common cause of helping students better understand our collective history. I am the grateful benefi ciary of their generosity, intelligence, and insight.

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viii

Introduction for Students

Historical documents allow us to peer into the past and learn what happened and what did not happen — crucial beginning points for understanding how and why the present came to be. They record bits of history and preserve the momentary ideas and experi- ences of individuals and groups. But how can you, a twenty-fi rst-century student, read and truly comprehend a letter from a seventeenth-century indentured servant or a nineteenth-century woman on the frontier, full of irregular spelling and contemporary references? How can you determine the historical value and accuracy of documents recorded years or even centuries ago? How can you read documents to fi gure out what really happened in the past?

FLAWS OF MEMORY It would be convenient if we did not need documents, if we could depend instead on our memory to tell us what happened. Unfortunately, memory is far from perfect, as we are reminded every time we misplace our keys. We not only forget things that did happen, but we also remember things that never occurred, such as erroneously thinking we put those keys right there on that shelf. Mark Twain once quipped, “When I was younger I could remember anything, whether it happened or not; but my faculties are decaying now, and soon I shall be so [old] I cannot remember any but the things that never happened.”

Twain’s witticism points to another important property of memory: It changes over time. Every good trial lawyer knows that memory is frag- ile, volatile, and subject to manipulation by our desires, intentions, and fears. Our memory is constantly reshaped to serve the needs of the pres- ent. Compounding the unreliability of memory are two stubborn realities: Most of the people who might remember something about what happened

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INTRODUCTION FOR STUDENTS ix

are dead, their memories erased forever; and no person, no single mem- ory, ever knew all there is to know about what happened.

DOCUMENTS AS HISTORICAL SNAPSHOTS These fl aws of memory might cause us to shrug wearily and conclude that it is im pos sible to determine what happened. But documents make it  pos sible to learn a great deal — although not every last thing — about what really happened. Because documents are created by humans, they are subject to all the frailties of memory, with one vital exception: Docu- ments do not change. Unlike memory, documents freeze words at a moment in time. Ideas, perceptions, emotions, and assumptions expressed in a document allow us to learn now about what happened then. In effect, documents are a bridge from the present to the past. They allow us to cross over and to discover how we got from there to here.

Today you can stand where the audience stood in 1863 to listen to Abraham Lincoln’s famous speech at the dedication of the cemetery for the Union soldiers killed at the battle of Gettysburg. Of course you can’t hear Lincoln’s voice, but you can read his words because the Gettysburg Address exists as a historical document; you can literally read this portion of the American past. The address transports the reader back to that crisp November day almost a century and a half ago, the outcome of the war very much in doubt, when the president and commander in chief of more than a million men in blue uniforms explained in a few words his view of the meaning of the war for the nation and the world. The address cap- tured Lincoln’s thoughts at that moment and preserved them, much like a historical snapshot. All documents have this property of stopping time, of indelibly recording somebody’s views at a specifi c moment in the past.

The documents in Reading the American Past allow you to travel back in time without getting up from your chair. You can accompany a slave owner as he visits his former slaves for the fi rst time after the Civil War and emancipation. You can listen to a young woman describe her life on the Great Plains frontier to her relatives back East. You can read the letters of soldiers during World War II who recount their part in the global mael- strom. You can witness the confession of the self-professed mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. These and the many other documents in this book bring the past alive in the words of the people who lived it.

DOCUMENTS CAPTURE DIVERSE VOICES AND EXPERIENCES Documents record far more than the ideas of presidents. They disclose, for instance, Pueblo Indians’ views of conquering Spaniards in the six- teenth century, Native American grievances against New En glanders who precipitated King Philip’s War in the seventeenth century, a woman’s pas- sionate argument for equality of the sexes in the eighteenth century, the confessions of slave insurrectionists in the nineteenth century, the views

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x READING THE AMERICAN PAST

of Vietnam War veterans in the twentieth century, an economist’s expla- nation of the Great Recession in the twenty-fi rst century, and much, much more. These views and many others are recorded by the documents in this collection. They permit you to read the American past from the diversity of perspectives that contributed to the making of America: women and men, workers and bosses, newcomers and natives, slaves and masters, voters and politicians, con serv atives and radicals, activists and reaction- aries, westerners and easterners, northerners and southerners, farmers and urbanites, the famous and the forgotten. These people created his- torical documents when they stole a spare moment to write a letter or record thoughts in a diary, when they talked to a scribbling friend or stranger, when they appeared in court or made a will, and when they delivered a sermon, gave a speech, or penned a manifesto. Examples of all  these kinds of documents are included in Reading the American Past. Together, they make it pos sible for you to learn a great deal about what really happened.

DOCUMENTS BRING YOU FACE-TO-FACE WITH THE PAST From the almost limitless historical record, I chose documents that clearly and vividly express an important perspective about a major event or a widespread point of view during a certain historical era. I selected docu- ments that are not only revealing but also often surprising, controversial, or troubling. My goal is to bring you face-to-face with the past through the eyes of the people who lived it.

Reading the American Past is designed to accompany The American Promise: A History of the United States. Each chapter in this volume paral- lels a chapter in The American Promise. The documents provide eyewitness accounts that broaden and deepen the textbook narrative. Chapter 16, for example, supplements the textbook discussion of Reconstruction with selections from fi ve documents: a report on the attitudes of whites in the former Confederacy in the summer of 1865; the Mississippi Black Code; advertisements of former slaves seeking lost family members; a planta- tion owner’s journal entry about his fi rst visit with his former slaves after they became free following the Civil War; and testimony of an African American Republican before the congressional committee investigating the Ku Klux Klan in 1871. Each selection is long enough to convey the central message of the author, but short enough to be read for the fi rst time in ten minutes or so. In general, each chapter in this book contains fi ve documents of roughly similar length.

READING AND UNDERSTANDING DOCUMENTS To help you read and understand the documents, a brief paragraph at the beginning of each chapter sketches the larger historical context, which your textbook explains in more detail. A headnote precedes each document

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INTRODUCTION FOR STUDENTS xi

and identifi es its source, explains who produced it and when, and sug- gests why it is revealing. Questions to aid your reading and discussion follow each selection and point you toward key passages and fundamen- tal ideas and ask you to consider both what a document says and what it means. More questions at the end of each chapter encourage you to com- pare and fi nd connections among the different documents.

While reading the documents in this book, it’s important to keep in mind the historical context; the author, date, and audience; and the mean- ings of the words themselves. Below are some guidelines and questions to consider while reading any primary document.

ESTABLISH THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT Getting the most out of these documents requires reading with care and imagination. Historians are interested in what a document says and what it reveals about the historical reality that is only partly disclosed by the document itself. A document might be likened to a window that permits us to glimpse features of the past. A document challenges us to read and understand the words on the page as a way to look through the window and learn about the larger historical context.

Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, for example, hints that he believed many loyal Americans wondered whether the war was worth the effort, whether all those soldiers, as he said, “have died in vain.” Lincoln’s words do not explicitly say that many people thought the human tragedy of the war was too great, but that seems to be one of their meanings. His address attempted to answer such doubts by proclaiming the larger meaning of the war and the soldiers’ deaths. His public statement of the noble ideals of the Union war effort hint at his private perception that many Ameri- cans had come to doubt whether the war had any meaning beyond the maiming or death of their loved ones.

To see such unstated historical reality in and through a document, readers must remain alert to exactly what the document says. The fi rst step is to learn something about the era in which the document was writ- ten by reading The American Promise or another textbook of American history.

IDENTIFY AUTHOR, DATE, AND AUDIENCE The next step in deciphering a document is to consider three important questions: Who wrote the document? When was it written? Who was the intended audience? These questions will help you understand the infor- mation in the brief headnote and answer the questions that accompany each document, as well as the concluding comparative questions that draw attention to similarities and differences among the documents in the chapter. While these editorial features will aid your investigation of the documents, you should always proceed by asking who wrote each docu- ment, when, and for what audience.

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xii READING THE AMERICAN PAST

Author. Obviously, a document expresses the viewpoint of its author. Dif- ferent people had different views about the same event. At Gettysburg, for example, the Confederacy suffered a painful defeat that weakened their ability to maintain their independence and to defend slav ery. If Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy, had delivered a Gettys- burg Address, it would have been very different from Lincoln’s. Docu- ments also often convey their authors’ opinions of the viewpoints of other people, including those who agree with them and those who don’t. You should always ask, then: What does a document say about the viewpoint of the author? What does it say about the author’s opinion about the views of other people? Does the document suggest the author’s point of view was confi ned to a few others, shared by a substantial minority, or embraced by a great many people? What motivated the author to express his or her point of view in the fi rst place? If the document has been trans- lated or transcribed by another person, what relationship did that person have with the author, and can we trust that the document accurately rep- resents the author’s thoughts?

Date. A document conveys valuable information about the era when it was composed as well as about the author’s point of view. Since a per- son’s perspective often changes over time, it is critical to know exactly when a document was written in order to understand its meaning. When Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address, the outcome of the Civil War remained in doubt; seventeen months later, in April 1865, he was certain of northern victory. The address expresses the urgency and uncertainty of the wartime crisis of 1863 rather than the relief and confi dence of 1865. As you read every document, you should ask: How does the document refl ect the era when the author wrote it? What does it say about the events under way at the time? What does it suggest about how that particular time was perceived by the author and by other people? How did the times shape the author’s thoughts and actions?

Audience. In addition to considering who wrote a document and when, you should think about the author’s intended audience. A politician may say one thing in a campaign speech and something quite different in a private letter to a friend. An immigrant might send a rosy account of life in America to family members in the Old Country — an account at odds with the features of life in the New World he or she describes in a diary. The intended audience shapes the message an author seeks to send. The author’s expectation of what the audience wants to hear contributes to what a document says, how it is said, and what is left unsaid. Lincoln knew that his audience at Gettysburg included many family members mourning the death of loved ones who “gave the last full mea sure of devotion” on the battlefi eld. He hoped his remarks would soothe the heartache of the survivors by ennobling the Union and those who died in its defense. To decipher any document, you should always ask: Who is the

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INTRODUCTION FOR STUDENTS xiii

intended audience? How did the audience shape what the author says? Did consideration of the audience lead the author to emphasize some things and downplay or ignore others? How would the intended audi- ence be likely to read the document? How would people who were not among the intended audience be likely to read it?

It is particularly important to consider the audience when reading interviews, since both the interviewer and interviewee can have different expectations of the same audience. If the interviewer’s questions are pro- vided, how do they guide and shape the responses of the interviewee? What is the interviewer’s motivation for conducting the interview, and what is the interviewee’s motivation for giving it?

DECIPHER THE LANGUAGE The meanings of words, like the viewpoints of individuals, also refl ect their historical moment. For the most part, the documents in this collec- tion were written in En glish and the authors’ original spelling has been preserved (unless stated otherwise), even if it fails to conform to common usage today. Numerous documents have been translated into En glish from Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, German, Swedish, or one of several Native American languages. But even documents originally written in En glish require you to translate the meaning of En glish words at the time the document was written into the meaning of En glish words today.

Readers must guard against imputing today’s meanings to yester- day’s words. When Lincoln said “this nation” in the Gettysburg Address, he referred to the United States in 1863, a vastly different nation from the one founded four score and seven years earlier and from the one that exists today, a century and a half later. The word is the same, but the meaning varies greatly.

Although the meaning of many words remains relatively constant, if you are on the lookout for key words whose meanings have changed, you will discover otherwise hidden insights into the documents. You can ben- efi t simply from exercising your historical imagination about the chang- ing meaning of words. To Lincoln, the phrase “all men are created equal” did not have the same meaning that it did for women’s rights leaders at the time, or for slaves or slave owners.

You should always pay attention to the words used in a document and ask a fi nal set of questions: How do the words in the document refl ect the author, the time, and the intended audience? Would the same words have different meanings to other people at that time? Does the author’s choice of words reveal covert assumptions and blind spots along with an overt message?

THE VALUE OF DOCUMENTS Historical documents not only provide readers with indelible markers of historical changes that have occurred, they also illuminate the role human beings played in making those changes. Documents instruct us about the

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xiv READING THE AMERICAN PAST

achievements and limitations of the past as they inspire and caution us for the future. Documents also instill in us a strong sense of historical humil- ity. Americans in the past were not less good or more evil, less right or more wrong, than we are today. Their ideas, their experiences, and their times were different from ours in many respects, but they made the nation we inhabit. Ideally, the documents in Reading the American Past will give you an appreciation of what it took, and will continue to take, to make American history happen.

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xv

Contents

Preface for Instructors iii

Introduction for Students viii

16. RECONSTRUCTION, 1863–1877 1

16–1 Carl Schurz Reports on the Condition of the Defeated South 1 Report on the Condition of the South, 1865

16–2 Black Codes Enacted in the South 5 Mississippi Black Code, November 1865

16–3 Former Slaves Seek to Reunite Their Families 9 Advertisements from the Christian Recorder,

1865–1870

16–4 Planter Louis Manigault Visits His Plantations and Former Slaves 14 A Narrative of a Post–Civil War Visit to Gowrie

and East Hermitage Plantations, March 22, 1867

16–5 Klan Violence against Blacks 18 Elias Hill, Testimony before Congressional Committee

Investigating the Ku Klux Klan, 1871

Comparative Questions 21

17. THE CONTESTED WEST, 1865–1900 22

17–1 Pun Chi Appeals to Congress in Behalf of Chinese Immigrants in California 22 A Remonstrance from the Chinese in California, ca. 1870

17–2 Mattie Oblinger Describes Life on a Nebraska Homestead 26 Mattie V. Oblinger to George W. Thomas,

Grizzie B. Thomas, and Wheeler Thomas Family, June 16, 1873

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xvi READING THE AMERICAN PAST

17–3 Texas Rangers on the Mexican Border 29 N. A. Jennings, A Texas Ranger, 1875

17–4 In-mut-too-yah-lat-lat Describes White Encroachment 33 Chief Joseph, Speech to a White Audience, 1879

17–5 A Plea to “Citizenize” Indians 36 Richard Pratt, “Kill the Indian . . . and save

the man,” 1892

Comparative Questions 39

18. BUSINESS AND POLITICS IN THE GILDED AGE, 1870–1895 41

18–1 Marshall Kirkman Likens Railroad Corporations to Armies 41 The Railway Army, 1894

18–2 William Graham Sumner on Social Obligations 45 What Social Classes Owe to Each Other, 1883

18–3 Henry Demarest Lloyd Attacks Monopolies 48 Wealth against Commonwealth, 1894

18–4 Andrew Carnegie Explains the Gospel of Wealth 52 Wealth, 1889

18–5 Henry George Explains Why Poverty Is a Crime 55 An Analysis of the Crime of Poverty, 1885

Comparative Questions 59

19. THE CITY AND ITS WORKERS, 1870–1900 60

19–1 A Textile Worker Explains the Labor Market 60 Thomas O’Donnell, Testimony before a U.S.

Senate Committee, 1885

19–2 Domestic Servants on Household Work 64 Interviews with Journalist Helen Campbell, 1880s

19–3 Jacob Riis Describes Abandoned Babies in New York City’s Slums 67 Waifs of New York City’s Slums, 1890

19–4 Walter Wyckoff Listens to Revolutionary Workers in Chicago 71 Among the Revolutionaries, 1898

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CONTENTS xvii

19–5 George Washington Plunkitt Explains Politics 75 William L. Riordon, Plunkitt of Tammany Hall, 1905

Comparative Questions 78

20. DISSENT, DEPRESSION, AND WAR, 1890–1900 79

20–1 Mary Elizabeth Lease Reports on Women in the Farmers’ Alliance 79 Women in the Farmers’ Alliance, 1891

20–2 White Supremacy in Wilmington, North Carolina 83 Gunner Jesse Blake, Narrative of the Wilmington

“Rebellion” of 1898

20–3 Pinkertons Defeated at Homestead 87 Pinkerton Guard Testimony, 1893

20–4 Confl icting Views about Labor Unions 90 N. F. Thompson, Testimony before the Industrial

Commission on the Relations and Conditions of Capital and Labor, 1900

Samuel Gompers, Letter to the American Federationist, 1894

20–5 Emilio Aguinaldo Criticizes American Imperialism in the Philippines 96 Case against the United States, 1899

Comparative Questions 100

21. PROGRESSIVISM FROM THE GRASS ROOTS TO THE WHITE HOUSE, 1890–1916 101

21–1 Jane Addams on Settlement Houses 101 The Subjective Necessity for Social Settlements, 1892

21–2 A Sociologist Studies Working-Class Saloons in Chicago 105 Royal Melendy, Ethical Substitutes for the Saloon, 1900

21–3 Mother Jones on the Futility of Class Harmony 109 Letter to Mrs. Potter Palmer, January 12, 1907

21–4 Marie Jenney Howe Parodies the Opposition to Women’s Suffrage 111 An Anti-Suffrage Monologue, 1913

21–5 Booker T. Washington on Racial Accommodation 114 The Atlanta Exposition Address, 1895

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xviii READING THE AMERICAN PAST

21–6 W. E. B. Du Bois on Racial Equality 117 Booker T. Washington and Others, 1903

Comparative Questions 120

22. WORLD WAR I: THE PROGRESSIVE CRUSADE AT HOME AND ABROAD, 1914–1920 122

22–1 The North American Review Considers War a Blessing, Not a Curse 122 For Freedom and Democracy, April 1917

22–2 Eugene V. Debs Attacks Capitalist Warmongers 126 Speech Delivered in Canton, Ohio, June 16, 1918

22–3 A Doughboy’s Letter from the Front 130 Anonymous Soldier, Letter to Elmer J. Sutters, 1918

22–4 Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer Defends America from Communists 133 The Case against the “Reds,” 1920

22–5 An African American Responds to the Chicago Race Riot 137 Stanley B. Norvell, Letter to Victor F. Lawson, 1919

Comparative Questions 142

23. FROM NEW ERA TO GREAT DEPRESSION, 1920–1932 143

23–1 Edward Earle Purinton Celebrates American Business as the Salvation of the World 143 Big Ideas From Big Business: Try Them Out for

Yourself, April 16, 1921

23–2 Reinhold Niebuhr on Christianity in Detroit 149 Diary Entries, 1925–1928

23–3 The Ku Klux Klan Defends Americanism 152 Hiram W. Evans, The Klan’s Fight for

Americanism, 1926

23–4 Mothers Seek Freedom from Unwanted Pregnancies 156 Margaret Sanger, Motherhood in Bondage, 1928

23–5 Marcus Garvey Explains the Goals of the Universal Negro Improvement Association 159 The Negro’s Greatest Enemy, 1923

Comparative Questions 163

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CONTENTS xix

24. THE NEW DEAL EXPERIMENT, 1932–1939 165

24–1 Martha Gellhorn Reports on Conditions in North Carolina in 1934 165 Martha Gellhorn to Harry Hopkins,

November 11, 1934

24–2 Working People’s Letters to New Dealers 169 Letter to Frances Perkins, January 27, 1935 Letter to Frances Perkins, March 29, 1935 Letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt, November 23, 1936 Letter to Frances Perkins, July 27, 1937 Letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt, November 27, 1939

24–3 Huey Long Proposes Redistribution of Wealth 174 Speech to Members of the Share Our Wealth

Society, 1935

24–4 A Mexican American Farmworker Describes the Importance of Sticking Together 177 Jose Flores, Interview, Farm Security Administration

Migrant Labor Camp, El Rio, California, 1941

24–5 Conservatives Criticize the New Deal 181 Herbert Hoover, Anti–New Deal Campaign

Speech, 1936 Minnie Hardin, Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt,

December 14, 1937

Comparative Questions 185

25. THE UNITED STATES AND THE SECOND WORLD WAR, 1939–1945 187

25–1 President Franklin D. Roosevelt Requests Declaration of War on Japan 187 Speech to Congress, December 8, 1941

25–2 A Japanese American War Hero Recalls Pearl Harbor 189 Grant Hirabayashi, Oral History, 1999

25–3 The Holocaust: A Journalist Reports on Nazi Massacres of Jews 192 Varian Fry, The Massacre of the Jews,

December 21, 1942

25–4 Soldiers Send Messages Home 197 Sergeant Irving Strobing, Radio Address from

Corregidor, Philippines, May 5 or 6, 1942

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xx READING THE AMERICAN PAST

John Conroy, Letter, December 24, 1942 Allen Spach, Letter, February 1943 James McMahon, Letter, March 10, 1944 David Mark Olds, Letter, July 12, 1945

25–5 Rosies the Riveter Recall Working in War Industries 204 Rosie the Riveter Memoirs, ca. 2004

Comparative Questions 208

26. COLD WAR POLITICS IN THE TRUMAN YEARS, 1945–1953 209

26–1 General Marshall Summarizes the Lessons of World War II 209 For the Common Defense, 1945

26–2 George F. Kennan Outlines Containment 213 The Long Telegram, February 22, 1946

26–3 Cold War Blueprint 217 NSC-68: U.S. Objectives and Programs for

National Security, 1950

26–4 Senator Joseph McCarthy Hunts Communists 221 Speech Delivered in Wheeling, West Virginia,

February 9, 1950

26–5 A Veteran Recalls Combat in the Korean War 225 Donald M. Griffi th Interview, 2003

Comparative Questions 228

27. THE POLITICS AND CULTURE OF ABUNDANCE, 1952–1960 229

27–1 Edith M. Stern Attacks the Domestic Bondage of Women 229 Women Are Household Slaves, 1949

27–2 Vance Packard Analyzes the Age of Affl uence 234 The Status Seekers, 1959

27–3 George E. McMillan Reports on Racial Conditions in the South in 1960 238 Sit-Downs: The South’s New Time Bomb, 1960

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CONTENTS xxi

27–4 Civil Defense in the Nuclear Shadow 242 North Dakota Civil Defense Agency,

How You Will Survive, 1960

27–5 President Dwight D. Eisenhower Warns about the Military-Industrial Complex 246 Farewell Address, January 1961

Comparative Questions 249

28. REFORM, REBELLION, AND REACTION, 1960–1974 250

28–1 New Left Students Seek Democratic Social Change 250 Students for a Democratic Society,

The Port Huron Statement, 1962

28–2 Martin Luther King Jr. Explains Nonviolent Resistance 254 Letter from Birmingham City Jail, 1963

28–3 George C. Wallace Denounces the Civil Rights Movement 259 The Civil Rights Movement: Fraud, Sham,

and Hoax, July 4, 1964

28–4 Black Power 263 Chicago Student Non-Violent Coordinating

Committee Leafl et, 1967

28–5 Equal Rights for Women 268 National Organization for Women,

Statement of Purpose, October 29, 1966

Comparative Questions 271

29. VIETNAM AND THE END OF THE COLD WAR CONSENSUS, 1961–1975 273

29–1 President Kennedy Explains Why We Are in Vietnam 273 Bobbie Lou Pendergrass, Letter to President

John F. Kennedy, February 18, 1963 President John F. Kennedy, Letter to Bobbie Lou

Pendergrass, March 6, 1963

29–2 A Secret Government Assessment of the Vietnam War 276 Robert S. McNamara, Actions Recommended

for Vietnam, October 14, 1966

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xxii READING THE AMERICAN PAST

29–3 Military Discipline in an Unpopular War 281 Robert D. Heinl Jr., The Collapse of the

Armed Forces, June 7, 1971

29–4 An American Soldier in Vietnam 284 Arthur E. Woodley Jr., Oral History of a

Special Forces Ranger

29–5 John Kerry Denounces the Vietnam War 289 Testimony before the Senate Committee on

Foreign Relations, 1971