to Chicago before 1860. From Troy, New York, went a large stove plant. That was followed by a shoe factory from Massachusetts. The packing industry rose as a matter of course at a point so advantageous for cattle raisers and shippers and so well connected with Eastern markets. To the opening of the Far West also the Lake region was indebted for a large part of that water-borne traffic which made it "the Mediterranean basin of North America." The produce of the West and the manufactures of the East poured through it in an endless stream. The swift growth of shipbuilding on the Great Lakes helped to compensate for the decline of the American marine on the high seas. In response to this stimulus Detroit could boast that her shipwrights were able to turn out a ten thousand ton Leviathan for ore or grain about "as quickly as carpenters could put up an eight-room house." Thus in relation to the Far West the old Northwest territory - the wilderness of Jefferson's time had taken the position formerly occupied by New England alone. It was supplying capital and manufactures for a vast agricultural empire West and South. America on the Pacific. It has been said that the Mediterranean Sea was the center of ancient civilization; that modern civilization has developed on the shores of the Atlantic; and that the future belongs to the Pacific. At any rate, the sweep of the United States to the shores of the Pacific quickly exercised a powerful influence on world affairs and it undoubtedly has a still greater significance for the future. Very early regular traffic sprang up between the Pacific ports and the Hawaiian Islands, China, and Japan. Two years before the adjustment of the Oregon controversy with England, namely in 1844, the United States had established official and trading relations with China. Ten years later, four years after the admission of California to the union, the barred door of Japan was forced open by Commodore Perry. The commerce which had long before developed between the Pacific ports and Hawaii, China, and Japan now flourished under official care. In 1865 a ship from Honolulu carried sugar, molasses, and fruits from Hawaii to the Oregon port of Astoria. The next year a vessel from Hongkong brought rice, mats, and tea from China. An era of lucrative trade was opened. The annexation of Hawaii in 1898, the addition of the Philippines at the same time, and the participation of American troops in the suppression of the Boxer rebellion in Peking COMMODORE PERRY'S MEN MAKING PRESENTS TO THE JAPANESE in 1900, were but signs and symbols of American power on the Pacific. Conservation and the Land Problem. The disappearance of the frontier also brought new and serious problems to the governments of the states and the nation. The people of the whole United States suddenly were forced to realize that there was a limit to the rich, new land to exploit and to the forests and minerals awaiting the ax and the pick. Then arose in America the questions which had long perplexed the countries of the Old World the scientific use of the soils and conservation of natural resources. Hitherto the government had followed the easy path of giving away arable land and selling forest and mineral lands at low prices. Now it had to face far more difficult and complex problems. It also had to consider questions of land tenure again, especially if the ideal of a nation of home-owning farmers was to be maintained. While there was plenty of land for every man or woman who wanted a home on the soil, it made little difference if single landlords or companies got possession of millions of acres, if a hundred men in one western river valley owned 17,000,000 acres; but when the good land for small homesteads was all gone, then was raised the real issue. At the opening of the twentieth century the nation, which a hundred years before had land and natural resources apparently without limit, was compelled to enact law after law conserving its forests and minerals. Then it was that the great state of California, on the very border of the continent, felt constrained to enact a land settlement measure providing government assistance in an effort to break up large holdings into small lots and to make it easy for actual settlers to acquire small farms. America was passing into a new epoch. References Henry Inman, The Old Santa Fé Trail. R. I. Dodge, The Plains of the Great West (1877). C. H. Shinn, The Story of the Mine. Cy Warman, The Story of the Railroad. Emerson Hough, The Story of the Cowboy. H. H. Bancroft is the author of many works on the West but his writings will be found only in the larger libraries. Joseph Schafer, History of the Pacific Northwest (ed. 1918). Questions 1. Name the states west of the Mississippi in 1865. 2. In what manner was the rest of the western region governed? 3. How far had settlement been carried? 4. What were the striking physical features of the West? 5. How was settlement promoted after 1865? 6. Why was admission to the union so eagerly sought? 7. Explain how politics became involved in the creation of new states. 8. Did the West rapidly become like the older sections of the country? 9. What economic peculiarities did it retain or develop? 10. How did the federal government aid in western agriculture? 11. How did the development of the West affect the East? The South? 12. What relation did the opening of the great grain areas of the West bear to the growth of America's commercial and financial power? 13. State some of the new problems of the West. 14. Discuss the significance of American expansion to the Pacific Ocean. Research Topics The Passing of the Wild West. Own Times, pp. 100-124. Haworth, The United States in Our The Indian Question. — Sparks, National Development (American Nation Series), pp. 265-281. The Chinese Question. Sparks, National Development, pp. 229-250; Rhodes, History of the United States, Vol. VIII, pp. 180–196. The Railway Age. — Schafer, History of the Pacific Northwest, pp. 230245; E. V. Smalley, The Northern Pacific Railroad; Paxson, The New Nation (Riverside Series), pp. 20-26, especially the map on p. 23, and pp. 142-148. Agriculture and Business. Schafer, Pacific Northwest, pp. 246–289. W. E. Smythe, The Conquest of Arid Studies of Individual Western States. CHAPTER XIX DOMESTIC ISSUES BEFORE THE COUNTRY (1865–1897) FOR thirty years after the Civil War the leading political parties, although they engaged in heated presidential campaigns, were not sharply and clearly opposed on many matters of vital significance. During none of that time was there a clash of opinion over specific issues such as rent the country in 1800 when Jefferson rode a popular wave to victory, or again in 1828 when Jackson's western hordes came sweeping into power. The Democrats, who before 1860 definitely opposed protective tariffs, federal banking, internal improvements, and heavy taxes, now spoke cautiously on all these points. The Republicans, conscious of the fact that they had been a minority of the voters in 1860 and warned by the early loss of the House of Representatives in 1874, also moved with considerable prudence among the perplexing problems of the day. Again and again the votes in Congress showed that no clear line separated all the Democrats from all the Republicans. There were Republicans who favored tariff reductions and "cheap money." There were Democrats who looked with partiality upon high protection or with indulgence upon the contraction of the currency. Only on matters relating to the coercion of the South was the division between the parties fairly definite; this could be readily accounted for on practical as well as sentimental grounds. After all, the vague criticisms and proposals that found their way into the political platforms did but reflect the confusion of mind prevailing in the country. The fact that, out of the eighteen years between 1875 and 1893, the Democrats held the House of Representatives for fourteen years while the |