Charles Postel on *Equality: An American Dilemma, 1866-1896*

For this episode, we spoke with Charles Postel about his recent book *Equality: An American Dilemma, 1866-1896.* After the Civil War, many social movements in favor of "equality" flourished in the U.S. -- champions of racial, sexual, regional, and economic equality pressed their case like never before. Organizations like the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and the Knights of Labor mobilized women and workers on a massive scale, while the Grange - a project initiated by federal bureaucrats from D.C. - assembled farmers into the largest and most coherent organ for class-interest in the country. Each had to face up to the practical dilemmas of pursuing national political power in an uneven and divided country.




****** LINKS ******

*The Populist Vision* - https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-populist-vision-9780195176506

*Equality: An American Dilemma* - https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780809079636/equality

"If They Repeal the Progressive Era, Should We Care?" - https://www.jstor.org/stable/43903026


*** REFRESHERS ***

The Grange - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Grange_of_the_Order_of_Patrons_of_Husbandry

Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woman%27s_Christian_Temperance_Union

Frances Willard - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Willard

Knights of Labor - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_Labor

Terence Powderly - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terence_V._Powderly

Chinese Exclusion Act - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Exclusion_Act

Homestead Acts - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homestead_Acts

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Harper

Elizabeth Cady Stanton - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Cady_Stanton

Henry George - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_George

Thomas Piketty - Capital in the Twenty-First Century - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_in_the_Twenty-First_Century

T. Thomas Fortune - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Thomas_Fortune

Ignatius Donnelly - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignatius_L._Donnelly

The Omaha Platform - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omaha_Platform


*** HISTORIOGRAPHY MENTIONED ***

David Montgomery - Beyond Equality: Labor and the Radical Republicans, 1862-1872 - https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/?id=p008696

Walter Johnson - The Broken Heart of America: St. Louis and the Violent History of the United States - https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/walter-johnson/the-broken-heart-of-america/9780465064267/

Gregg Cantrell - The People’s Revolt - Texas Populists and the Roots of American Liberalism - https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300100976/peoples-revolt