The Industrial Revolution
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I decided to write about chapter three because I really like learning about the Industrial Revolution and how it changed the entire economy. The first document I read about was very hard to understand. Most of it seemed like someone who didnt have a clue what they were talking about, yet other parts promise to help all people in need. Emma Lazars was the daughter of a prosperous Jewish family in New York, she wrote this poem to help raise funds for the Statue of Liberty to have a pedestal to sit on. The verse or poem she wrote appears at the base of the statue, which was usually the first thing immigrants saw when they arrive in the harbor of New York. I believe that this immigrant took advantage of the conditions in the US by trying to make money her own creative way. The Industrial Revolution definitely provided her with a great opportunity to make herself know for a very long time to come. Something she probably had no clue she was doing, but ended up making history for herself.
The next two documents are very contradicting, because one is praised on how easy it is to go to America and make loads of money fast, and the other can barely keep work or food constant. Document two is from the perspective of a young boy who is very excited about the golden country he hears about. He makes it seem like the conditions of America are nothing but opportunities waiting for people to be in command of. In the dialogue of document three, a man answers questions of his work, wages, meals and family. This immigrant makes the conditions of America look very poor and poverty stricken. He hardly makes a dollar and a half every day, and has to provide for his whole family. He informs the man asking him questions, that sometimes they have to go a day with nothing to eat, and when they do eat is little to nothing. There meals are usually porridge or a little bit of bread. In the little boys perspective everyone who goes over to America, gets to eat bread and meats everyday even if you were the ordinary workman. It just seems like a dream come true if he gets to go to the golden country. A regular workman could have anything he wanted in the eyes of a little boy. A real working man who struggles day to day knows the truth of trying to keep his whole family alive on hardly anything.
What the boy doesnt mention is all the poverty in document three, along with the opportunity of work running short. Everything that was provided as the immigrants opportunity was not all glory. I think that the Americans looked at these people as cheap labor, but to the immigrants it was long days and little to show for it. I do think there was opportunity to get away from there home land to be free and work towards something new. After the long days of hard work and little time able to be spent with there familys, the workers decided that they needed to from some kind of union. This was to guarantee a certain pay with set hours of work. The union allowed eight hours for family, eight hours for sleep, and also eight hours of hard work. This method of work was very effective because it allowed the workers time off to spend with their family, to get more sleep, and to put money back into the economy, creating more jobs, or opportunities for others.
In 1878 the knights of the Labor Demand reform was put together to create rights for all workers. This is giving new combers better opportunities, hopefully meaning less people coming over and being claimed by poverty. This reform was very helpful and even Samuel Gompers begins asking, “What does the working man want?” Document six is a speech from Samuel Gompers, who addresses a huge crowd of wage workers. He tells them that others think if they are given an opportunity to have more free time that they will only get drunk, yet they know they would rather spend that time making the rest of there lives more significant. I think they were given a great opportunity to thrive off of this three eight hour shift idea, creating a better work place because of everyones ability to have other things to look forward to besides work and sleep. I think its true that if you give a man one thing he will want a little more, because it is in our blood to want bigger and better things no matter what. The original immigrants who dealt with the long hours and little sleep made due with what they had, and turned the way of the industrial revolution into fair labor treatment. About fifty to a hundred thousand people showed up to state a point, that the employers will not dictate the way they work. The wage workers wanted more, they want to spend time doing what they wanted after work and still be able to get a good amount of sleep.
Document six seems like the wealthy people were looked upon as a waste of time, like they had nothing to do all day so that made them worthless. The wage workers never really meet