LAD #23: Keating-Owen child labor act of 1916

In the Keating-Owen act, child labor hours were limited and the interstate trade of products made by children was outlawed. By 1900 over 2 million children were reported to be working in the American factory system. This census outraged many Americans and started a reform movement to limit child labor. The National child Labor committee was formed and they hired Lewis Hine to photograph children in factories. In addition, authors such as Charles Dickens ridiculed child labor with such novels as Oliver Twist. Although the bill tried to limit child labor, it was defeated in 1918 in the courtcase Hammer v. Dagenhart. Government power over child labor finally succeeded in 1938 with the Fair Labor Standards Act. which won the court case U.S. v. Darby.

LAD #22: Wilson's First Inaugural Address

In Woodrow Wilson's first inaugural address, the President addressed how the senate, house and the presidency has come under the rule of the democratic party. Wilson attributed this success of the party with the growing desire for change and reform among the people of this country. Wilson addressed how the nation has grown and become a world power over the past 150 years.

However, Wilson also talked about how these advances have had their own costs. The natural forests were being logged. In addition, thousands of factory workers had lost their lives to dangerous conditions and many more have been injured by such machinery. Wilson addressed how the tariff needed to be lowered and the government needed to be on the side of the people and not big businesses. Wilson's speech cried freedom and change to the entire country.

LAD #21: Dawes Act

The Dawes act was an act that would allow individual native americans to have the right to own their own land on reservations. The plots of land were given out according to age as well as if you had a family or not. In case there is not enough land for each native american, the government had planned many precautions under the dawes act. The native americans were given the right to choose their own piece of land. If two chose the same piece, it would be divided in two and the rest of their land would be in another place. If they didnt choose in 4 years, an agent would choose for them. If a native american doesnt live on a reservation, they will still receive their piece of land. all of the native americans will also receive patents for their land and it will be protected. These native americans can now be punished for breaking the law and can be protected by the law. In addition, and native american not associated with a tribe can become and american citizen. these opportunities were not given tribes such as the Iroquois and Sioux.

LAD #20: Bryan's Cross of Gold Speech

Bryan's cross of gold speech, which was the most famous speech made by a politician in America, spoke of the matter of whether silver should be freely coined at a 16:1 ration with gold.

In the first paragraph of the speech, Bryan opened up the argument with the statement that people live and die, but principles last forever, and that day they were deciding on a principle. In the time of the speech, a group of democrats called the silver Democrats took control of the party and slowly moved throughout the country, pushing for the free coinage of silver. In this decision, men did not side on their own personal opinions, they sided with their own group's opinion. Bryan argued that the businessmen of the northeast were too strict and did not keep in mind the needs of the average man. He argued that farmers and miners were just as good businessmen as the ones in New England. Bryan claims they are fighting for the common man in the Midwest and other places, who needs the silver in order to pay off their debts. He also believed that the income tax was good for the people and that the government should be in charge of coining money. many people cared more about the gold issue than the tariff because it was a more important issue at the time. Bryan urged that we must stray away from the gold standard and move toward bimetallism.

LAD #19: Populist Party Platform

In the late 19th century, the populist party rose as a third power in the presidential elections. They opposed the concentration of capital in the hands of the wealthy and supported that common American man.

The populist party also wished to increase the standard of living in America. They believed that the factory workers were not getting paid enough and conditions in America were slumping to European levels. They also believed that the corrupt corporations were decreasing the value of silver so they could benefit from the value of gold. They claimed that they were there because the parties were not doing anything to stop the corruption in the country. They supported labor unions and the rights of workers. They also believed that the government had to start intervening with the railroad companies throughout the county. They believed in unrestricted coinage of both gold and silver. They also believed that money needed to be circulated to the people faster and more money should be put into the economy.

They believed that telephone companies should be operated by the government instead of private companies. They also pledged to hold an open ballot, pension for ex-union soldiers, keep foreigners from getting American jobs, and to protect the rights of the people

LAD #18: McKinley's War Message

In 1895, fighting broke out between the Spanish and the Cubans. The Cubans were hoping to win their freedom from the Spanish. Three short years later, partially fueled by the sinking of the U.S.S. Maine, the United States entered the war on the side of the Cubans.

In his War message, McKinley stated to congress that the war raging on was now affecting the American citizens. He stated that the people were shocked by the atrocities taking place in the war. In addition, it was affecting the American economy as well. The United States had a large amount of trade with Cuba and the war that was going on was damaging the trade relations.

McKinley goes on to say that the war has dragged on for three years and there is still no clear winner yet. He thought that it was necessary for the United States to either act as a neutral nation to help solve the problem, or act as a military ally to one of the countries.

McKinley believed the U.S. needed to intervene because we needed to stop the bloodshed, we needed to protect the citizens of Cuba, we needed to protect our trade, and we needed to protect our own government and freedom.

McKinley Then urges that the U.S. needs to go to Cuba because the U.S.S. Maine was blown up by was was thought to be a submarine torpedo.

LAD #17: Carnegie's Gospel of Wealth

In Andrew Carnegie's Gospel of Wealth, the scottish-born millionare talked about how the rich should behave and how their wealth should be taken care of.

First of all, Carnegie believed that it would benefit the society more if some of the people were wealthy and others were not. Carnegie believed that in order for society to evolve, their needed to be a higher class of rich people in order to benefit the growth of society. He believed that to have a small percent of the population be rich would be better than having the entire population be poor.

Carnegie also believed that the rich people in society needed to distribute their money in some kind of way. He stated that this could be done in three ways. The first way was to distribute the money to your heirs when you died, in order to keep the money in the family. Carnegie didn't support this method because he believed that this would not help the greater good of society. Carnegie also believed that the burden of controlling all of that money should not be placed on the heirs of the deceased. The second way that Carnegie believed money could be distributed was it would be given away after the millionaire has died. He believed that they should give it away during their lifetime, which was his third method.

Carnegie also believed in a public death tax, which would tax the deceased wealth after they died. Carnegie liked this method because it would make sure that the money would go towards public funds such as building libraries and other buildings that everyone could use. he believed that was more effective than giving out small sums to every family, since the buildings would be there for hundreds of years.