Produced by G. Edward Johnson, Charlene Taylor, Graeme Mackreth and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net [Illustration: Copyright, 1912, Moffett, Chicago [Signature]Woodrow Wilson] THE NEW NATION BY FREDERIC L. PAXSON PROFESSOR OF HISTORY UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN [Illustration: logo] HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO The Riverside Press Cambridge COPYRIGHT, 1915, BY FREDERIC L. PAXSON ALL RIGHTS RESERVED The Riverside Press CAMBRIDGE MASSACHUSETTS U.S.A. PREFACE A new nation has appeared within the United States since the Civil War, but it has been only accidentally connected with that catastrophe. The Constitution emerged from the confusion of strife and reconstruction substantially unchanged, but the economic development of the United States in the sixties and seventies gave birth to a society that was, by 1885, already national in its activities and necessities. In many ways the history of the United States since the Civil War has to do with the struggle between this national fact and the old legal system that was based upon state autonomy and federalism; and the future depends upon the discovery of a means to readjust the mechanics of government, as well as its content, to the needs of life. This book attempts to narrate the facts of the last half-century and to show them in their relations to the larger truths of national development. FREDERIC L. PAXSON. CONTENTS I. THE CIVIL WAR 1 II. THE WEST AND THE GREENBACKS 20 III. THE RESTORATION OF HOME RULE IN THE SOUTH 39 IV. THE PANIC OF 1873 59 V. THE HAYES ADMINISTRATION 75 VI. BUSINESS AND POLITICS 92 VII. THE NEW ISSUES 108 VIII. GROVER CLEVELAND 126 IX. THE LAST OF THE FRONTIER 142 X. NATIONAL BUSINESS 162 XI. THE FARMERS' CAUSE 177 XII. THE NEW SOUTH 192 XIII. POPULISM 208 XIV. FREE SILVER 225 XV. THE "COUNTER-REFORMATION" 244 XVI. THE SPANISH WAR 258 XVII. THEODORE ROOSEVELT 276 XVIII. BIG BUSINESS 293 XIX. THE "MUCK-RAKERS" 309 XX. NEW NATIONALISM 324 INDEX i MAPS AND CHARTS THE RAILWAYS OF THE "OLD NORTHWEST" 13