Beginning in the 1870's and lasting into the early 1900's America experienced an Industrial Revolution. With the rise of new businesses came the rise of new business tactics and these tactics led to domination by the large corporations and trusts. Since there was big growth in businesses there was a greater demand for jobs. Millions of people immigrated to America during this time from poor countries to try and make money and live a better life. Since there was a large workforce the revolution continued to grow however this occurred at a great cost. For example as the number of workers increased the working conditions worsened. There was also a sense of nativism among American workers and this led to the American workers mistreating immigrant workers. There were defiantly several hardships but the workers were able to preserve and this made the industrial era very prosperous for many people. When analyzing the amount of immigrants arriving, the mistreatment of immigrants by Americans, and corrupt business owners it is evident that there was a great cost to the rise of industry yet these costs did not affect its growth.
The United States saw a large increase in immigration as the 20th century approached. The reason many immigrants began coming to the United States is due to the external problems faced in European countries as well as the rumored success stories from America. An example of an external problem was during the 1800's when the United States saw a massive amount of Irish immigrants due to the potato famine that caused starvation in many families. In addition to famines there was a widespread agriculture depression in Europe and this led not only to starvation but also to unemployment for farmers. These problems led to many wanting to start fresh and they thought the best place to do so was America. Many immigrants came to America and found that the stories they heard about America were not entirely true. Many immigrants struggled to become familiar with American customs and the big industry style. Immigrants that were able to find were usually paid very poorly and could not support their families and this led to poor standards of living which would be similar to that of their former country. Even though there were several downfalls for immigrants they continued to come to America and the workforce continued to grow.
Work was not the only hard thing for immigrants when coming to America. Many immigrants had to deal with intense racial and religious discrimination. The American workforce began to dislike foreigners because they were taking jobs from "pure" Americans. Americans began to act superior towards these immigrants the irony of this is that many immigrants left their European countries because of racial and religious discrimination. The act of nativism has been evident in American history since the birth of the nation. An example of early nativism was the Alien and Sedition Acts which gave the government the right to deport any immigrant for no specific reason. These acts and the actions of the American people during the Industrial Revolution show that not only immigrants would have to work hard in order to succeed in a new country they would have to take a good amount of discrimination. This sense of nativism was clearly a cost of the Industrial Revolution yet the immigrants did not stop coming to America so the workforce continued to expand and industries kept growing.
The main reason many Americans lost their jobs to immigrants is because the Americans did not want to sacrifice their pay or increase their hours. During the Industrial Revolution there was no minimum wage set by the government therefore employers paid workers barley anything. There was also no working hours set so many employers required their workers to work an insane amount of hours per week. The conditions in many factories were horrid since they were overcrowded and had insufficient air flow. There were also no child labor laws so it was very common to see young children working around dangerous machines and this led to serious injuries and death. These injuries and deaths led to the rise of labor unions which sought to correct the problems in factories. However once labor unions were formed it was already to late many children lost their lives and many adults' lives would be changed forever due to the poor health conditions. It is evident when examining the factory conditions and the rise of labor unions that even though the horrid conditions were a great cost of the Industrial Revolution the rise of labor unions was a benefit.
Business owners thought they were kings and this led to corruption. Business owners tried to affect the government by getting politicians elected who would aid the business's cause in order to make the owner millions of dollars. One of the most famous corrupt business owners during the industrial era was William Marcy Tweed who was also referred to as Boss Tweed. Tweed fixed several elections in order to be elected to the New York State Senate. When Tweed was on the Senate he stole millions of dollars from taxpayers to fund his luxurious lifestyle. Tweed's corruption continued for several years. Thomas Nast however began to expose Tweed's corruption through his weekly cartoons. Eventually Tweed was arrested in 1871 and he went to jail. There were many other business owners like Tweed several failed to recognize the living conditions of their workers and some used force on their workers. However Jacob Riis' novel How the Other Half Lives and Lincoln Steffens The Shame of Cities showed the difference between the lifestyle of the rich and the poor. These novels motivated the government to enforce change in business operations.
It is evident when looking at urbanization that it came at a great cost however there were defiantly some benefits. Immigrants endured the most of these costs because they had to suffer hard working conditions and the discrimination from nativists. The benefits however were there because due to the Industrial Revolution there were many technological advances that would be critical as the 20th century began. The progress made during the Industrial Revolution is evident but it did indeed come at a great cost and the progress made kept the United States a global superpower throughout the 20th century.
Sources
David Benett, The Party of Fear: From Nativist Movements to the New Right in American History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988).
Ellis Cose, A Nation of Strangers: Prejudice, Politics, and the Populating of America (New York: Morrow, 1992).
James Crawford, Hold Your Tongue: Bilingualism and the Politics of "English Only" (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1992).
Roger Daniels, Asian America: Chinese and Japanese in the United States Since 1950 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1988).
Oscar Handlin, Race and Nationality in American Life (Boston: Little, Brown, 1957).
John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860-1925 2d ed. (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1988).
Maldwyn Allen Jones, American Immigration, 2d ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992).
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