White Working Class Americans During the Late

White working class Americans during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries found themselves in a social order that was fundamentally reorganizing itself. The railroads stitched the nation together at the same time as they began to wrench people and communities out of their rural or agrarian ways of life. The abolishment of slavery meant that agriculture needed to be altered within the south, and it drove many Americans to seek out new ways to reassert the racial hierarchies that had so long been the heart of America's social order. Some working class whites looked to new political movements to answer the emerging questions and difficulties of the changing times. Many acted to strengthen the labor movement, but found fierce and violent resistance from businessmen and corporations. Ultimately, it was a difficult and perilous time for the white working class, fraught with numerous failures and some successes. Essentially, the emergence of the industrial age restructured American society in ways that relied upon old class and ethnic divisions but in entirely new ways.

One of the most significant ways in which the western world changed during after the Civil War is associated with transportation. Primarily, this change was brought about by advancements in the refining of steel, and the invention of the steam engine. The consequences for travel and commerce in the United States and Europe were enumerable. Additionally, the social makeup of the land was drastically changed by these forces. In the United States, for example, when the Union Pacific Railroads traversed the thousands of miles of American soil; often, if the railways failed to pass through an existing town, the people moved away; in fact, new towns and cities were often formed by virtue of where the railroads converged. This began another large trend that would continue to this day: the urbanization of the developed world.

Essentially, it was during the nineteenth century that an increasing number of people began to move away from rural farming communities and into the city. This was made possible by the vast distances that goods and foods could be transported. In other words, cities were able to be supported by larger areas of land because these new modes of transportation could supply people's needs with greater efficiency. The move to the city was also fostered by what came to be known as the Industrial Revolution. This revolution began in cloth factories in England, but soon spread throughout Europe and the Americas, and altered the manner in which many previously home made goods were produced. Businessmen discovered that they could increase production and lower costs by setting up massive plants by which products could be manufactured far more quickly. This generated far more urban jobs, thus contributing greatly to the swelling western cities.

The Populist Movement emerged out of these growing economic concerns, which were acutely felt by white farmers in the post Civil War era. However, the actual form and ideology that the movement generated was not uniformly accepted by all of its proponents. Although the concrete economic woes of the individual farmer were enough motivation for one sect of society to solidify politically, what attracted many other learned people to the Populist cause was a sort of nostalgia summarized by the "agrarian myth." The agrarian myth became the bedrock of the moral backing for the pull away from industrialization and commercialization of agriculture, and towards the traditional, self-sufficient farmer. Generally, the practical backing for the Populist Movement came from the fact that foreign demand for American products increased and this, in turn, built increased competition between individual farmers and, more importantly, between regions. It became essential for eastern farmers to expand their lands far outside of the cities, and for all farmers to employ more modern tools and techniques to keep pace with the demands of competition. Nevertheless, the agrarian myth remained a powerful force because it was a reaction against this trend towards mechanization and dehumanization of the agricultural process. Additionally, the myth was a perfect reflection of the individualistic nature of the American Dream; it theoretically reinforced the idea that people were not subject to amoral economic forces -- they controlled their own social destinies.

The Populist Party, however, failed under this ideological and social fragmentation. By 1890 many differing political and social factions had been pulled together under the same banner to such an extent that nothing decisive could ever be done to counteract the aims of the social elite. Ultimately, the issues of individual, small farmers were never addressed, and they began to disappear from the American landscape.

Still, Immigration racism also became a major issue for white Americans following the Civil War. By 1890 an enormous wave of immigration had begun, and the composition of this group was rather different than those that immigrated during and immediately after the war; they had been nearly fifty percent Irish. By this time, however, the anti-immigration sentiment had been brewing for half a century, and racial values played an even stronger role in the laws that came out of this age. This wave of immigrants was primarily made up of eastern and southern Europeans, whom many Americans looked down upon. Of course, this was during a time when extreme views like eugenics were being perpetuated by leading thinkers and governments. Many people firmly believed criminal behavior, laziness, stupidity, and allegiances to political parties were heritable traits passed on from generation to generation. This sort of mentality facilitated numerous anti-immigration policies and ideas like social Darwinism; this was because people felt that many foreigners and lower-class members of society were inherently anarchists and desired nothing less than to destroy the foundation of the American infrastructure and economic system.

Out of similar justifications emerged groups like the Ku Klux Klan, who seemed bent on both determining the racial makeup the nation, and on reestablishing the privileged position of white communities in general. Essentially, since the government no longer officially sanctioned white supremacy, secretive societies were established to take-up this abandoned role. Still, white voters in the southern states managed to firmly support laws that instilled segregation as the replacement of slavery, and to impose numerous laws that made it difficult for black Americans to exercise their new voting rights.