Download or read book The Rumble of California Politics 1848 1970 written by Royce D. Delmatier and published by . This book was released on 1970 with total page 508 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The California Gold Rush and the Coming of the Civil War written by Leonard L. Richards and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2008-02-12 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Award-winning historian Leonard L. Richards gives us an authoritative and revealing portrait of an overlooked harbinger of the terrible battle that was to come. When gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill in 1848, Americans of all stripes saw the potential for both wealth and power. Among the more calculating were Southern slave owners. By making California a slave state, they could increase the value of their slaves—by 50 percent at least, and maybe much more. They could also gain additional influence in Congress and expand Southern economic clout, abetted by a new transcontinental railroad that would run through the South. Yet, despite their machinations, California entered the union as a free state. Disillusioned Southerners would agitate for even more slave territory, leading to the Kansas-Nebraska Act and, ultimately, to the Civil War itself.

Download or read book California Progressivism Revisited written by William F. Deverell and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2023-09-01 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: California was perhaps the most important locus for the development of the Progressive reform movement in the decades of the twentieth century. These twelve original essays represent the best of the new scholarship on California Progressivism. Ranging across a spectrum that embraces ethnicity, gender, class, and varying ideological stances, the authors demonstrate that reform in California was a far broader, more complicated phenomenon than we have previously understood. Since the 1950s, scholars have used California Progressivism as a model case study for explaining early twentieth-century social and political reform nationwide. But such a model—which ignored issues of class, race, and gender—simplified a political movement that was, in fact, quite complex. In revising the monolithic interpretation of reform and reformers, this volume provides a better understanding of the sweeping reform impulses that had such a profound effect on American political and social institutions during this century. Equally important, the issues examined here offer significant insights into problems that the entire country must tackle as we approach the new century.

Download or read book Triumph of the Right written by Kurt Schuparra and published by M.E. Sharpe. This book was released on 1998-09-24 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this, the first book to deal exclusively with conservative politics in California, author Kurt Schuparra pinpoints the myriad factors that led to the formation and rise of the conservative movement in California after World War II, culminating in the election of Ronald Reagan as governor in 1966. While Schuparra is concerned with prominent figures such as Ronald Reagan, California senator William Knowland, Richard Nixon, and Arizona senator Barry Goldwater, his larger interest is in the principal players in the movement behind these individuals, the causes they espoused, and the movement's role in pivotal electoral contests. Schuparra also provides an assessment of how the struggle between liberals and conservatives - and those caught in the middle - in the Golden State both reflected and influenced the national debate over major governmental policies and social issues, particularly on racial matters.

Download or read book Why David Sometimes Wins written by Marshall Ganz and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2009-05-28 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why David Sometimes Wins tells the story of Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers' groundbreaking victory, drawing important lessons from this dramatic tale. Since the 1900s, large-scale agricultural enterprises relied on migrant labor--a cheap, unorganized, and powerless workforce. In 1965, when some 800 Filipino grape workers began to strike under the aegis of the AFL-CIO, the UFW soon joined the action with 2,000 Mexican workers and turned the strike into a civil rights struggle. They engaged in civil disobedience, mobilized support from churches and students, boycotted growers, and transformed their struggle into La Causa, a farm workers' movement that eventually triumphed over the grape industry's Goliath. Why did they succeed? How can the powerless challenge the powerful successfully? Offering insight from a longtime movement organizer and scholar, Ganz illustrates how they had the ability and resourcefulness to devise good strategy and turn short-term advantages into long-term gains. Authoritative in scholarship and magisterial in scope, this book constitutes a seminal contribution to learning from the movement's struggles, set-backs, and successes.

Download or read book The Golden State in the Civil War written by Glenna Matthews and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-03-26 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book breaks new ground, not only in its coverage of California, but also in its treatment of the role of cultural links in enhancing national loyalty, in its attention to many groups of people of color, including Chinese and Latinos, and what happened to them during the Civil War. In addition, the book devotes attention to the ebb and flow of the two political parties and to the little-known fact that nearly 17,000 California men and women volunteered for military service on behalf of the Union. Glenna Matthews broadens understanding of the Civil War era both in terms of geography and in terms of social groupings.

Download or read book Antebellum and Civil War San Francisco written by Monika Trobits and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2014-11-11 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Americans migrated westward, they took their politics with them, making San Francisco a microcosm of the nation as the Civil War loomed. Spurred by the promise of gold, hungry adventurers flocked to San Francisco in search of opportunity on the eve of the Civil War. The city flourished and became a magnet for theater. Some of the first buildings constructed in San Francisco were theater houses, and John Wilkes Booth’s famous acting family often graced the city’s stages. In just two years, San Francisco’s population skyrocketed from eight hundred to thirty thousand, making it an “instant city” where tensions between transplanted Northerners and Southerners built as war threatened the nation. Though seemingly isolated, San Franciscans took their part in the conflict. Some extended the Underground Railroad to their city, while others joined the Confederate-aiding Knights of the Golden Circle. Including a directory of local historic sites and streets, author Monika Trobits chronicles the dramatic and volatile antebellum and Civil War history of the City by the Bay. Includes photos

Download or read book Farm Workers and the Churches written by Alan J. Watt and published by Texas A&M University Press. This book was released on 2010-02-23 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the mid-1960s, the charismatic César Chávez led members of California's La Causa movement in boycotting the grape harvest, and melon pickers in South Texas called a strike against growers, contesting unfair labor and wage practices in both states. In Farm Workers and the Churches, Alan J. Watt shows how the religious and social contexts of the farm workers, their leaders, and the larger society helped or hindered these two pivotal actions. Watt explores the ways in which liberal expressions of Northern Protestantism, transplanted to California and combined with the pro-labor wing of the Catholic Church and the heritage of Mexican popular piety, provided a fertile field for the growth of broad support for Chávez and his organizing efforts. Eventually, La Causa was able to achieve collective bargaining victories, including a historic labor contract between California agribusiness and farm workers. The movement did not fare as well in Texas, where the combination of a locally weak union leadership, a more conservative Southern Protestant ethos, and the strikebreaking measures of the Texas Rangers all boded ill. However, a general Chicano/a movement ultimately took permanent root in the state, because of the workers' struggle. Watt offers a careful examination of the complex interactions among religious traditions, social heritage, and ethnicity as these factors affected the course and outcomes of these two pioneering campaigns undertaken by La Causa.

Download or read book American Fascism and the New Deal written by Nelson A. Pichardo Almanzar and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2013-08-28 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American Fascism and the New Deal demonstrate how fascist ideas gained popularity in the Associated Farmers of California during the 1930s and 40s. It shows that the politics of the intervening decades created economic and political policies that planted the seeds for these fascist ideas by forming alliances between the corporate-private realm and the state-public realm. These same alliances made FDR and subsequent political figures rethink the direction they wanted to take American democracy. Through a careful analysis of the Associated Farmers of California, Nelson A. Pichardo Almanzar and Brian Kulik show how the AFC formed positions in direct alliance with fascist ideas, but also why these ideas resonate with so many people even to this day. The analysis presented in American Fascism and the New Deal will be of particular interest to sociologists, especially social movement theorists; Chicana/o studies scholars; political scientists; business ethicists; and historians.

Download or read book Rise and Triumph of the California Right 1945 66 written by Kurt Schuparra and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-09-16 with total page 231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this, the first book to deal exclusively with conservative politics in California, author Kurt Schuparra pinpoints the myriad factors that led to the formation and rise of the conservative movement in California after World War II, culminating in the election of Ronald Reagan as governor in 1966. While Schuparra is concerned with prominent figures such as Ronald Reagan, California senator William Knowland, Richard Nixon, and Arizona senator Barry Goldwater, his larger interest is in the principal players in the movement behind these individuals, the causes they espoused, and the movement's role in pivotal electoral contests. Schuparra also provides an assessment of how the struggle between liberals and conservatives - and those caught in the middle - in the Golden State both reflected and influenced the national debate over major governmental policies and social issues, particularly on racial matters.

Download or read book Engineers and Irrigation written by United States. Board of Commissioners on the Irrigation of the San Joaquin, Tulare, and Sacramento Valleys of the State of California and published by . This book was released on 1990 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Railroad Crossing written by William F. Deverell and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1994-03-02 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nothing so changed nineteenth-century America as did the railroad. Growing up together, the iron horse and the young nation developed a fast friendship. Railroad Crossing is the story of what happened to that friendship, particularly in California, and it illuminates the chaos that was industrial America from the middle of the nineteenth century through the first decade of the twentieth. Americans clamored for the progress and prosperity that railroads would surely bring, and no railroad was more crucial for California than the transcontinental line linking East to West. With Gold Rush prosperity fading, Californians looked to the railroad as the state's new savior. But social upheaval and economic disruption came down the tracks along with growth and opportunity. Analyzing the changes wrought by the railroad, William Deverell reveals the contradictory roles that technology and industrial capitalism played in the lives of Americans. That contrast was especially apparent in California, where the gigantic corporate "Octopus"—the Southern Pacific Railroad—held near-monopoly status. The state's largest employer and biggest corporation, the S.P. was a key provider of jobs and transportation—and wielder of tremendous political and financial clout. Deverell's lively study is peopled by a rich and disparate cast: railroad barons, newspaper editors, novelists, union activists, feminists, farmers, and the railroad workers themselves. Together, their lives reflect the many tensions—political, social, and economic—that accompanied the industrial transition of turn-of-the-century America.

Download or read book Reform and Retrenchment written by Robert G. Boatright and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2024 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Reform and Retrenchment, Robert G. Boatright explores changes in American primary election laws from the 1920s to the 1970s. He shows that political parties, factions, and reform groups manipulated primary election laws in order to gain an advantage over their opponents, often under the guise of enhancing democracy. Boatright looks at how this history can help us understand the reform ideas before us today, ultimately suggesting that, for all of its flaws, there is likely little that can be done to improve primaries, and those who would seek to change American politics are best off exploring reforms to other areas of elections and governance.

Download or read book When Movements Matter written by Edwin Amenta and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-11-10 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Movements Matter accounts for the origins of Social Security as we know it. The book tells the overlooked story of the Townsend Plan--a political organization that sought to alleviate poverty and end the Great Depression through a government-provided retirement stipend of $200 a month for every American over the age of sixty. Both the Townsend Plan, which organized two million older Americans into Townsend clubs, and the wider pension movement failed to win the generous and universal senior citizens' pensions their advocates demanded. But the movement provided the political impetus behind old-age policy in its formative years and pushed America down the track of creating an old-age welfare state. Drawing on a wealth of primary evidence, historical detail, and arresting images, Edwin Amenta traces the ups and downs of the Townsend Plan and its elderly leader Dr. Francis E. Townsend in the struggle to remake old age. In the process, Amenta advances a new theory of when social movements are influential. The book challenges the conventional wisdom that U.S. old-age policy was a result mainly of the Depression or farsighted bureaucrats. It also debunks the current view that America immediately embraced Social Security when it was adopted in 1935. And it sheds new light on how social movements that fail to achieve their primary goals can still influence social policy and the way people relate to politics.

Download or read book In Pursuit of Utopia written by Errol Wayne Stevens and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2021-07-01 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the Great Depression, the Los Angeles area was rife with radical movements. Although many observers thought their ideas unworkable, even dangerous, Southern Californians voted for them by the tens of thousands. This book asks why. To find answers, author Errol Wayne Stevens takes readers through the history of such movements as the Utopian Society, Dr. Francis Townsend’s old-age revolving pension plan, Upton Sinclair’s End Poverty in California gubernatorial campaign, and Retirement Life Payments, known as Ham and Eggs. The book also examines the Los Angeles Communists and the free-market capitalists, both quasi-religious movements with large followings, as well as the self-help cooperatives, a spontaneous upsurge of neighbors who came together to help one another in a time of desperate need. As to these movements’ extraordinary popularity, Stevens finds the standard explanations unpersuasive. He debunks the idea that naïve, unsophisticated Southern Californians, living aimless, empty lives, suffering from ennui, and longing for community, readily supported charismatic leaders who promised a way out of the Great Depression. In Stevens’s telling, Southern Californians supported these movements because they spoke to their needs. Fearful or desperate, some elderly and hopeless, Angelenos cared less about the programs’ feasibility than about their promise of relief. As one Ham and Eggs supporter succinctly explained: “It may be a racket and maybe it won’t work more than a couple of weeks, but that will be $60 more than I ever got before for one vote.” Finding parallels between past and present, readers might wonder why people remain loyal to programs that prove unrealistic, or why voters continue to support leaders who reveal, time and again, their ignorance or dishonesty. In its illumination of a troubled time in American history not so long ago, this book offers insight into our own.

Download or read book Harvard Guide to American History written by Frank Freidel and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1974 with total page 644 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Editions for 1954 and 1967 by O. Handlin and others.

Download or read book Dark Sweat White Gold written by Devra Weber and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2023-04-28 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In her incisive analysis of the shaping of California's agricultural work force, Devra Weber shows how the cultural background of Mexican and, later, Anglo-American workers, combined with the structure of capitalist cotton production and New Deal politics, forging a new form of labor relations. She pays particular attention to Mexican field workers and their organized struggles, including the famous strikes of 1933. Weber's perceptive examination of the relationships between economic structure, human agency, and the state, as well as her discussions of the crucial role of women in both Mexican and Anglo working-class life, make her book a valuable contribution to labor, agriculture, Chicano, Mexican, and California history. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1994. In her incisive analysis of the shaping of California's agricultural work force, Devra Weber shows how the cultural background of Mexican and, later, Anglo-American workers, combined with the structure of capitalist cotton production and New Deal politics