r rights through politics. They went straight to the state and federal government. The employers on the other hand did all they could to destroy the groups of people, using either the government or the courts (Boardman 12).Problems between the workers and the companies persisted. There was a brief fear of a civil war. These confrontations gave the state power to keep things under control. During 1887 there were bloody railroad strikes, which resulted in the government coming in and keeping the situation under control. What is now called the “National Guard” was called in for the matter. During this era, public and government police forces, militias, and detective agencies made themselves known (Balkin 19).Industrial capitalism’s quest for regularity and standardization in the workplace, an environment that times both men and machines, had a long American history, dating at least to Benjamin Franklin’s belief in his Advice to a Young Tradesman that ‘Time Is Money’ (Balkin 18).“In the simplest terms, capitalism can be defined as the condition of possessing capital,” of having money to invest for financial gain. The term capitalism also expresses favoritism to capitalists, who are individuals who gather capital. They then allow others to invest and the company becomes an industrial enterprise (Wohl 1).In the Victorian Era, for the first time in history, industry became more important than agriculture. Companies became more dependent on machines than workers. Most enterprises were partly owned by the same people or trusts. By 1900 there was 185 large combinations of companies. The same people owned one third of all companies (Boardman 16).Farmers from the West and South felt that they were losing their status economically and socially. The farmers felt that their trouble was due to the bankers and railroads. They could not borrow money from the banks because the interest was high. The problem ...
