SUMMARY 1. In 1864 the Republican party was split, and one part, taking the name of National Union party, renominated Lincoln. The other or radical wing, which wanted a more vigorous war policy, nominated Frémont and Cochrane. The Democrats declared the war a failure, demanded peace, and nominated McClellan and Pendleton. 2. The gradual conquest of the South brought up the question of the relation to the Federal government of a state which had seceded. 3 Lincoln marked out his own plan of reconstruction in an amnesty proclamation. Congress thought he had no right to do this, and adopted a plan which Lincoln vetoed. His death left the question for Johnson to settle. 4. Johnson adopted a plan of his own and soon came into conflict with Congress. 5. Congress began by refusing seats to congressmen from states reconstructed on Johnson's plan. It then passed, over Johnson's veto, a series of bills to protect the freedmen and give them civil rights. 6. Six states accepted the terms of reconstruction offered, and their senators and representatives were admitted to Congress (1868). 7. Johnson, in 1866, traveled about the West abusing Congress. For this, and chiefly for his disregard of the Tenure of Office Act, he was impeached by the House and tried and acquitted by the Senate. States cannot secede; only some of their people were in insurrection. Amnesty proclamation. Recognizes Arkansas, Tennessee, and Thirteenth Amendment. (Provisional governors. Ratify Thirteenth Amendment. New state constitutions made. Congress refuses them seats. Civil Rights Bill. Freedmen's Bureau Bill. Tenure of Office Act. Reconstruction Act. Fourteenth Amendment. CHAPTER XXXI THE NEW WEST (1860-1870) 488. Discovery of Gold near Pikes Peak. In the summer of 1858 news reached the Missouri that gold had been found on the eastern slope of the Rockies, and at once a wild rush set in for the foot of Pikes Peak, in what was then Kansas. During 1858 a party from the gold mines of Georgia pitched a camp on Cherry Creek and called the place Aurania. Later, in the winter, they were joined by General Larimer with a party from Leavenworth, Kan., and by them the rude camp at Aurania was renamed Denver, in honor of the governor of Kansas. In another six months emigrants came pouring in. from every point along the frontier. Some, providing themselves with great white-covered wagons, drawn by horses, oxen. or mules, joined forces for better protection against the Indians, and set out together, making long wagon trains or caravans. All were accompanied by men fully armed. Such as could not afford a “prairie schooner," as the canvas-covered wagon was called, put their worldly goods into handcarts. By 1859 Denver was a settlement of 1000 people. They needed supplies and, to meet this demand, the firm of Russell, Majors, and Woddell put a daily line of coaches on the road from Leavenworth to Denver. This means of communication brought so many settlers that by 1860 Denver was a city of frame and brick houses, with two theaters, two newspapers, and a mint for coining gold. 489. The Pony Express; the Overland Stage. - By that time, too, the first locomotive had reached the frontier of Kansas. But between the Missouri and the Pacific there was still a gap of 2000 miles which the settlers demanded should be spanned at once, and it was. In 1860 the same firm that sent the first stagecoach over the prairie from Leavenworth to Denver, ran a pony express from the Missouri to the Pacific. Their plan was to start at St. Joseph, Mo., and send the mail on horseback across the continent to San Francisco. As the speed must be rapid, there must be frequent relays. Stations were therefore established every twenty-five miles, and at them fresh horses and riders were kept. Mounted on a spirited Indian pony, the mail carrier would set out from St. Joseph and gallop at breakneck speed to the first relay station, swing himself from his pony, vault into the saddle of another standing ready, and dash on toward the next station. At every third relay a fresh rider took the mail. Day and night, in sunshine and storm, over prairie and mountain, the mail carrier pursued his journey alone. The cost in human life was immense. The first riders made the journey of 1996 miles in ten days. Next came the Wells and Fargo Express, and then the Butterfield Overland Stage Company. 490. The Union Pacific Railroad; the Land Grant Roads. Meantime the war opened, and an idea often talked of took definite shape. California had scarcely been admitted, in 1850, when the plan to bind her firmly to the Union by a great railroad, built at national cost, was urged vigorously. By 1856 the people began to demand it, and in that year the Republican party, and in 1860 both the Republican and Democratic parties, pledged themselves to build one. The secession of the South, and the presence at Denver of a growing population, made the need imperative, and in 1862 Congress began the work. Two companies were chartered. One, the Union Pacific, was to begin at Omaha and build westward. The other, tle Central Pacific, was to begin at Sacramento and build eastward till the two met. The Union Pacific was to receive from the government a subsidy in bonds of $16,000 for each mile built across the plains, $48,000 for each of 150 miles across the Rocky Mountains, and $32,000 a mile for the rest of the way. It received all told on its 1033 miles $27,226,000. The Central Pacific, under like conditions, received for its 883 miles from San Francisco to Ogden $27,850,000. But the liberality of Congress did not end here. Each road was also given every odd-numbered section in a strip of public land twenty miles wide along its entire length. Grants of land 491. Land Grants for Railroads and Canals. in aid of such improvements were not new. and 1860 Congress gave away to canals, roads, and railroads 215,000,000 acres. This magnificent expanse would make seven states as large as Pennsylvania, or three and a half as large as Oregon, and is only 6000 acres less than the total area of the thirteen original states with their present boundaries. Although the roads were chartered in 1862, the work of construction was not begun till 1866, and the last rail was not laid till May 10, 1869. 492. The Silver Mines; New States and Territories. - What the discovery of gold did for California and Denver, silver and the railroad did for the country east of the Sierras. In 1859 some gold seekers in what was then Utah discovered the rich silver mines on Mt. Davidson. Population rushed in, Virginia City sprang into existence, the territory of Nevada was formed in 1861, and in 1864 entered the Union as a state. In 1861 Colorado was made a territory, and what is now North and South Dakota and Montana was organized as the territory of Dakota. Hardly was this done when gold was found in a gulch on the Jefferson Fork of the Missouri River. Bannock City, Virginia City, and Helena were laid out almost immediately, and in 1864 Montana was made a territory. In 1862 precious metals were found in what was then eastern Washington; and the old Hudson Bay Company's post of Fort Boise became a thriving town. Idaho City and Lewiston followed, and in 1863 the territory of Idaho was formed. In 1863 Arizona was cut off from New Mexico, and in 1868 Wyoming, taken from Nebraska in 1867, was made a territory. 493. Population in 1870. Thus in the decade from 1860 to 1870 gold, silver, and the Pacific Railroad gave value to the American Desert, brought two states (Nevada and Nebraska) into the Union, and caused the organization of six new territories. More than 1,000,000 people then lived along the line of the Union Pacific. The total population of the United States in 1870 was 38,000,000. SUMMARY 1. What the discovery of gold did for California in 1849, it did for the "Great American Desert" in 1858. 2. The consequences were the founding of Denver, the establishment of a stagecoach line from the Missouri to Denver, the pony express to the Pacific; the overland coach; and the Pacific Railroad. 3. Gold, the railroad, and the silver mines led to the organization of Colorado, Nevada, Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming, and the admission of Nebraska and Nevada into the Union. 4. Other causes led to the organization of Arizona and Dakota. |