OF THE UNITED STATES BY FREDERIC L. PAXSON Professor of History in the University of Wisconsin COPYRIGHT, 1921 AND 1922, BY FREDERIC L. PAXSON ALL RIGHTS RESERVED The Riverside Dress 9738 Papra PREFACE Two eras of American history are separated by the Civil War period. The earlier one was dominated by national growth across the continent, and ended only when the Union had been maintained and the defeated Confederacy had been brought prostrate. The actual fighting of the Civil War came to an end shortly after Appomattox; but various aspects of the struggle lingered on until the Southern States were back in the Union, until military repression was abandoned, until the attempt to settle social status by constitutional amendment was substantially given up, and until coin replaced paper as the basis of American finance. The new era, in which we live, took shape amid the confusion of the Civil War; but not until the inauguration of President Hayes, in 1877, did it shake itself free from the entanglements of that crisis, or escape from its war-time mind. Thereafter it speedily found itself, and blossomed into maturity. This book describes the transition from an agricultural civilization to one of industry, from a state of isolation to one of world triumph, from an America with European creditors to an American penetration of the world. Its consecutive narrative begins with the administration of Hayes, for it looks toward the future rather than the past; but on every essential topic it goes back as far as need be to gather up facts that are useful for a full understanding of the United States of to-day. It is a history of the age we live in, and begins when the Civil War and its aftermath had begun to fade. It presents a wide array of topics, leaving readers, who like the writer have lived the period, to draw their own conclusions. MADISON, WISCONSIN FREDERIC L. PAXSON 941473 CONTENTS Inauguration of Hayes Cabinet and Congress - Home rule in the South-Educational renascence - Land-grant colleges - Reli- writers - Transition in literature-"Ethiopiomania" - Dialect lit- erature - Provincialism — Historical writing — Bibliographical note. Silver and greenbacks Decline in silver - Mining booms and free Cornell - Return of Grant - Nominations of 1880 - Election of Garfield Patronage and the Senate Murder of Garfield - Ches- Congressional elections, 1882 — Tariff revision-National prosperity |