A School History of the United States Part 51

By 1859 Denver was a settlement of 1000 people. They needed supplies, and, to meet this demand, the firm of Russell, Majors, and Waddell put a daily line of coaches on the road from Leavenworth to Denver. This means of communication brought so many settlers that by 1860 Denver was a city of frame and brick houses, with two theaters, two newspapers, and a mint for coining gold.

%489. The Pony Express; the Overland Stage.%--By that time, too, the first locomotive had reached the frontier of Kansas. But between the Missouri and the Pacific there was still a gap of 2000 miles which the settlers demanded should be spanned at once, and it was. In 1860 the same firm that sent the first stagecoach over the prairie from Leavenworth to Denver, ran a pony express from the Missouri to the Pacific. Their plan was to start at St. Joseph, Mo., and send the mail on horseback across the continent to San Francisco. As the speed must be rapid, there must be frequent relays. Stations were therefore established every twenty-five miles, and at them fresh horses and riders were kept. Mounted on a spirited Indian pony, the mail carrier would set out from St. Joseph and gallop at breakneck speed to the first relay station, swing himself from his pony, vault into the saddle of another standing ready, and dash on toward the next station. At every third relay a fresh rider took the mail. Day and night, in sunshine and storm, over prairie and mountain, the mail carrier pursued his journey alone.

The cost in human life was immense. The first riders made the journey of 1996 miles in ten days. Next came the Wells and Fargo Express, and then the b.u.t.terfield Overland Stage Company.

%490. The Union Pacific Railroad; the Land Grant Roads.%--Meantime the war opened, and an idea often talked of took definite shape.

California had scarcely been admitted, in 1850, when the plan to bind her firmly to the Union by a great railroad, built at national cost, was urged vigorously. By 1856 the people began to demand it, and in that year the Republican party, and in 1860 both the Republican and Democratic parties, pledged themselves to build one. The secession of the South, and the presence at Denver of a growing population, made the need imperative, and in 1862 Congress began the work.

Two companies were chartered. One, the Union Pacific, was to begin at Omaha and build westward. The other, the Central Pacific, was to begin at Sacramento and build eastward till the two met. The Union Pacific was to receive from the government a subsidy in bonds of $16,000 for each mile built across the plains, $48,000 for each of 150 miles across the Rocky Mountains, and $32,000 a mile for the rest of the way. It received all told on its 1033 miles $27,226,000. The Central Pacific, under like conditions, received for its 883 miles from San Francisco to Ogden $27,850,000. But the liberality of Congress did not end here. Each road was also given every odd-numbered section in a strip of public land twenty miles wide along its entire length.

%491. Land Grants for Railroads and Ca.n.a.ls.%--Grants of land in aid of such improvements were not new. Between 1827 and 1860 Congress gave away to ca.n.a.ls, roads, and railroads 215,000,000 acres. This magnificent expanse would make seven states as large as Pennsylvania, or three and a half as large as Oregon, and is only 6000 acres less than the total area of the thirteen original states with their present boundaries.

Although the roads were chartered in 1862, the work of construction was slow at first, and the last rail was not laid till May 10, 1869.

%492. The Silver Mines; New States and Territories.%--What the discovery of gold did for California and Denver, silver and the railroad did for the country east of the Sierras. In 1859 some gold seekers in what was then Utah discovered the rich silver mines on Mt. Davidson.

Population rushed in, Virginia City sprang into existence, the territory of Nevada was formed in 1861, and in 1864 entered the Union as a state.

In 1861 Colorado was made a territory, and what is now North and South Dakota and the land west of them to the Rocky Mountain divide became the territory of Dakota. Hardly was this done when gold was found in a gulch on the Jefferson Fork of the Missouri River. Bannock City, Virginia City, and Helena were laid out almost immediately, and in 1864 Montana was made a territory. In 1860 and 1862 precious metals were found in what was then eastern Washington; Lewiston, Idaho City, and the old Hudson Bay Company's post of Fort Boise became thriving towns, and in 1863 the territory of Idaho was formed, with limits including what is now Montana and part of Wyoming. In 1863 Arizona was cut off from New Mexico, and in 1868 Wyoming was made a territory.

%493. Population in 1870.%--Thus in the decade from 1860 to 1870 gold, silver, and the Pacific Railroad gave value to the American Desert, brought two states (Nevada and Nebraska) into the Union, and caused the organization of six new territories. More than 1,000,000 people then lived along the line of the Union Pacific. Our total population in 1870 was 38,000,000.

SUMMARY

1. What the discovery of gold did for California in 1849, it did for the "Great American Desert" in 1858.

2. The consequences were the founding of Denver, the establishment of a stagecoach line from the Missouri to Denver, the pony express to the Pacific; the overland coach; and the Pacific Railroad.

3. Gold, the railroad, and the silver mines led to the organization of Colorado, Nevada, Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming, and the admission of Nebraska and Nevada into the Union.

4. Other causes led to the organization of Arizona and Dakota.

New States (1860-1870).

Kansas, 1861.

West Virginia, 1863.

Nevada, 1864.

Nebraska, 1867.

Total number of states in 1870, 37.

New Territories (1860-1870).

Colorado, 1861.

Dakota, 1861.

Idaho, 1863.

Arizona, 1863.

Montana, 1864.

Wyoming, 1868.

_THE ECONOMIC STRUGGLE_

CHAPTER x.x.xII

POLITICS FROM 1868 TO 1880

%494. New Issues before the People.%--Five years had now pa.s.sed since the surrender of Lee, and nine since the firing on Sumter. During these years the North, aroused and united by the efforts put forth to crush the Confederacy, had entered on a career of prosperity and development greater than ever enjoyed in the past. With this changed condition came new issues, some growing out of the results of the war, and some out of the development of the country.

%495. Amnesty.%--In the first place, now that the war was over, the people were heartily tired of war issues. Taking advantage of this, certain political leaders began, about 1870, to demand a "general amnesty" [1] or forgiveness for the rebels, and a stoppage of reconstructive measures by Congress.

[Footnote 1: In 1863, Lincoln offered "full pardon" to "all persons"

except the leaders of the "existing rebellion." Johnson, in 1865, again offered amnesty, but increased the cla.s.ses of excepted persons; and, though in the autumn of 1867 he cut down the list, he nevertheless left a great many men unpardoned.]

%496. The National Finances.%--A second issue resulting from the war was the management of the national finances. January 1, 1866, the national debt amounted to $2,740,000,000, including (1) the bonded debt of $1,120,000,000, and (2) the unbonded or floating debt of $1,620,000,000, that part made up of "greenbacks," fractional currency, treasury notes, and the like. Two problems were thus brought before the people:

1. What shall be done with the national bonded debt?

2. How shall the paper money be disposed of and "specie payment"

resumed?

As to the first question, it was decided to pay the bonds as fast as possible; and by 1873 the debt was reduced by more than $500,000,000.

As to the second question, it was decided to "contract the currency" by gathering into the Treasury and there canceling the "greenbacks." This was begun, and their amount was reduced from $449,000,000 in 1864 to $356,000,000 in 1868.

By that time a large part of the people in the West were finding fault with "contraction." Calling in the greenbacks, they held, was making money scarce and lowering prices. Congress, therefore, in 1868 yielded to the pressure, and ordered that further contraction should stop and that there should not be less than $356,000,000 of greenbacks.

%497. "The Ohio Idea"; the Greenback Party.%--But there was still another idea current. To understand this, six facts must be remembered.

1. In 1862 Congress ordered the issue of certain 5-20 bonds; that is, bonds that might be paid after five years, but must be paid in twenty years. 2. The interest on these bonds was made payable "in coin." 3. But nothing was said in the bond as to the kind of money in which the princ.i.p.al should be paid. 4. When the greenbacks were issued, the law said they should be "lawful money and a legal tender for all debts, public and private, within the United States, except duties on imports and interest as aforesaid." 5. This made it possible to pay the princ.i.p.al of the 5-20 bonds in greenbacks instead of coin. 6. Fearing that payment of the princ.i.p.al in greenbacks might have a bad effect on future loans, Congress, when it pa.s.sed the next act (March 3, 1863) for borrowing money, provided that _both_ princ.i.p.al and interest should be paid in coin.

At that time and long after the war "coin" commanded a premium; that is, it took more than 100 cents in paper money to buy 100 cents in gold.

Anybody who owned a bond could therefore sell the coin he received as interest for paper and so increase the rate of interest measured in paper money. The bonds, again, could not be taxed by any state or munic.i.p.ality.

Because of these facts, there arose a demand after the war for two things--taxation of the bonds and payment of the 5-20's in greenbacks.

This idea was so prevalent in Ohio in 1868 that it was called the "Ohio idea," and its supporters were called "Greenbackers."

%498. Opposition to Land Grants to Railroads.%--Much fault was now found with Congress for giving away such great tracts of the public domain. In 1862 a law known as the Homestead Act was pa.s.sed. By it a farm of 80 or 160 acres was to be given to any head of a family, or any person twenty-one years old, who was a citizen of the United States or, being foreign born, had declared an intention to become a citizen, provided he or she lived on the farm and cultivated it for five years.

Under this great and generous law 103,000 entries for 12,000,000 acres were made between 1863 and 1870. This showed that the people wanted land and was one reason why it should not be given to corporations.

%499. The Election of 1868.%--The questions discussed above (pp.

437-439) became the political issues of 1868.

The Republicans nominated Grant and Schuyler Colfax and declared for the payment of all bonds in coin; for a reduction of the national debt and the rate of interest; and for the encouragement of immigration.

The Democrats nominated Horatio Seymour and Francis P. Blair, and demanded amnesty; rapid payment of the debt; "one currency for the government, and the people, the laborer, and the office holder"; the taxation of government bonds; and no land grants for public improvements.

The popular vote was 5,700,000. In the electoral college Grant had 214 votes, and Seymour 80.