Timestamp 2:48: In the 1830’s, Americans had to figure out how to get Democracy to work. The framers outlined how the government would work, but failed to figure out how the politicians would communicate with those that they govern and how the populace has their say.
Timestamp 5:00: Andrew Jackson promised much of the Land in the Southeast to wealthy planters who would vote for him, which were at the time being used by the Native Americans. This prompts the “Trail of Tears” and in turn the spread of slavery. As people don’t know how to live in a democracy, as this is the first Modern Democracy, Andrew Jackson Destroys the banking system which causes an economic crisis. This leads to people reconsidering the efficacy of Democracy.
Timestamp 18:24: Transportation changed America in many ways. The affluent people tend to live near water, which is where news tends to travel by. During this time, it is easier and cheaper to travel by water vs Land. At this time, land stopped you where as water facilitated travel. This fact facilitated the introduction of canals to make the cost of travel cheaper (i.e the Saint Lawrence Canal). Once the freezing of canals became an issue, there was a rise in railroad building in the 1850’s which is where the transition to favoring land travel began. Horses had issues with being prone to illness, but there was a rise in the popularity of Bicycles, which allowed people’s range of travel to expand, therefore their knowledge of events expanded.
Timestamp 30:44: Transportation becomes important during WW1 as the traditional warfare becomes irrelevant, as people are in planes, boats, tanks, and other modes of transportation. This becomes known as the war that we marched out of the 19th century, as the war started with a car and ended in planes. This facilitates the car industry boom in the 1950’s and the rise in the commercial airline industry after WW2
Timestamp 35:10: An important historical event that most people get wrong is the compromise of 1877. There was no compromise, but rather a suppression of voting which led to three southern states to support Rutherford Hayes in exchange for Railroad contracts and the removal of troops. There is a misconception that this was a compromise which was seeded in a book.
Timestamp 47:30: What happened before Social Security? For the most part, people depended on their kids before the creation of this social safety net or worked until they passed. When Social Security was created, life expectancy was shorter.
Timestamp 56:10: History is important because it is the study of the past and change of society. This explains how and why things happen. These events are sometimes believed to be triggered by great men, religion, etc but in most cases it is believed that Ideas make it happen.
[From wikipedia] Richardson’s first book, The Greatest Nation of the Earth (1997), stemmed from her dissertation at Harvard University. Inspired by Eric Foner’s work on pre-Civil War Republican ideology, Richardson analyzed Republican economic policies during the war. She contended that their efforts to create an activist Federal Government during the Civil War marked a continuation of Republican free labor ideology. These policies, such as war bonds and greenbacks or the Land Grant College Act and the Homestead Act, revolutionized the role of the Federal Government in the U.S. economy. At the same time, these actions laid the groundwork for the Republican Party’s shift to Big Business after the Civil War.
In this 2001 book, Richardson "focused on the “Northern abandonment of Reconstruction.” Building on the earlier work of C. Vann Woodward, she argued that a more complete understanding of the period required appreciation of class, not only race. As Reconstruction continued into the 1870s and especially the 1880s, Republicans began to view African Americans in the South more from a class perspective and less from the perspective of race that had driven their earlier humanitarianism. In the midst of the labor struggles of the Gilded Age, Republicans came to compare “the demands of the ex-slaves for land, social services, and civil rights” to the demands of white laborers in the North. This ideological shift was the key to Republican abandonment of Reconstruction, as they chose the protection of their economic and business interests over their desire for racial equality." [From wikipedia]
In this 2007 book, "Richardson presented Reconstruction as a national event that impacted all Americans, not just those in the South. She incorporated the West into the discussion of Reconstruction as no predecessor had. Between 1865 and 1900, Americans re-imagined the role of the federal government, calling upon it to promote the well-being of its citizens. However, racism, sexism, and greed divided Americans, and the same people who increasingly benefited from government intervention—white, middle-class Americans—actively excluded African-Americans, Native Americans, immigrants, and organized laborers from the newfound bounties of their reconstructed nation." [from wikipedia]
In this book, published in 2010, Richardson "focused on the U.S. Army’s slaughter of Native Americans in South Dakota in 1890. She argued that party politics and opportunism led to Wounded Knee. After a bruising midterm election, President Benjamin Harrison needed to shore up his support. To do so, he turned to The Dakotas, where he replaced seasoned Indian agents with unqualified political allies, who incorrectly assumed that the Ghost Dance Movement presaged war. The Army responded by sending one third of its force in order to avoid spending cuts from Congress. After the event, Republicans tried to paint the massacre as a heroic battle to stifle the resurgent Democrats." [wikipedia]
In this 2014 book, Richardson "extended her study of the Republican Party into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. This book studied the entire life of the GOP, from its inception in the 1850s through the presidency of George W. Bush. The party’s founders united against the “slave power,” a small group of wealthy white men who controlled all three branches of government. These Republicans articulated a new vision of an America in which all hardworking men could rise. But after the Civil War, Republicans began to emulate what they originally opposed. They tied themselves to powerful bankers and industrialists, sacrificing the well-being of ordinary Americans. A similar process took place after World War II, when Republicans sought to dismantle successful New Deal policies and prop up the wealthy. However, in both cases, reformers within the party were able to return the GOP to its founding vision of equality of opportunity, first Theodore Roosevelt during the Progressive Era, and then Dwight D. Eisenhower, who enforced integration and maintained the New Deal. The Nixon and Reagan administrations have represented yet another fall from the GOP’s founding purpose. It's ironic, Richardson points out, that Republicans treated Barack Obama with an unprecedented level of disrespect, as Obama's rise from humble beginnings to the highest office in the nation embodied the vision of the original Republicans." [wikipedia]
In her most recent publication, Richardson argues "that America was founded with contradicting ideals, with the ideas of liberty, equality, and opportunity on one hand, and slavery and hierarchy on the other. United States victory in the American Civil War should have settled that tension forever, but at the same time that the Civil War was fought, Americans also started moving into the West. In the West, Americans found and expanded upon deep racial hierarchies, meaning that hierarchical values survived in American politics and culture despite the crushing defeat of the pro-slavery Confederacy. Those traditions--a rejection of democracy, an embrace of entrenched wealth, the marginalization of women and people of color--have found a home in modern conservative politics, leaving the tremendous promise of America unfulfilled." [wikipedia]
