Politics, Labor, and the War on Big Business: The Path of Reform in Arizona, 1890-1920

3. Populists Make Their Case and Their Mark

43 PopulistsMakeTheirCaseandTheirMark The national Populist or People’s Party, formed in 1891, represented farmers, workers, and others who—for one reason or another—were unhappy with the way the economic, social, and political systems were evolving in the last decades of the nineteenth century. The preamble to the party’s platform, adopted in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1892, described the United States as a nation in which labor was impoverished and “the fruits of the toil of millions are boldly stolen to build up colossal fortunes for a few.” For the Populists, this land of “tramps and millionaires” was on the “verge of moral, political, and material ruin.” In the midst of all this, the two national parties , as the Populists saw it, “propose[d] to drown out the outcries of a plundered people with the uproar of a sham battle over the tariff, so that capitalists, corporations , national banks, rings, trusts, watered stock, the demonetization of silver, and the oppressions of the usurers may all be lost sight of.”1 Populists offered a broad-ranging program to head off the disaster. They called for government ownership of the railroads and other monopolies such as telephone and telegraph companies. For the Populists, it was a matter of the people owning the giant corporations or being owned by them. For labor, the T h r e e 44 P o P u l i s t s m a k e t h e i r c a s e a n d t h e i r m a r k Populists demanded recognition of the right to organize, an end to the Pinkerton system of industrial armies, and an eight-hour day. The Populists also campaigned for several measures intended to protect the political system against special interests . Included among these were the secret ballot, popular election of US senators, and the initiative and referendum. Though it was less central to most Populists than other planks in their platform, the free coinage of silver became one of their central “talking points.” The Populists took root in Arizona in the early 1890s, came to life in the 1894 and 1896 elections, and by 1898 had rapidly declined. In the interim they had given voice to an anti-corporate program carried on by other third parties and the Hunt Democrats. In 1892 the national Populists chose James B. Weaver of Iowa, a former Republican and general in the Union Army, as their nominee for president. Weaver had been the Greenback Party’s presidential nominee in 1880. The Populist candidate toured the country offering a broad-ranging reform program organized around the theme “equal rights for all and special privileges for none,” a mantra picked up and frequently used by George Hunt. Though portrayed as a lunatic by the major parties, Weaver secured more than a million votes in 1892, 9 percent of the total votes cast. He carried Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Nevada, and North Dakota.2 Populists in much of the Mountain West made considerable noise that year, most notably by electing Davis Waite governor in Colorado, but they were relatively quiet in Arizona. This resulted in part from the fact that Arizona Populists had no presidential election around which to rally the troops. There were Populist candidates for office in the territory in 1892, but active organizations existed in only a few counties. Editors of the mainstream press in Arizona depicted the Populist movement in the territory as weak, destined for a short life. They gave the Populists little coverage, and what coverage they gave was generally negative. In some places such as Nogales, Populist organizations went out of their way to emphasize that, contrary to what was often charged, their members came from among “our best and most substantial citizens.” They were not a bunch of cranks, soreheads, or disappointed office seekers, as frequently charged.3 The Arizona Daily Gazette, a Democratic paper in Phoenix, attributed the emergence of the Populist Party in that city to a plot concocted by Maricopa County Republicans to draw votes away from Democrats.4 If so, the plot failed miserably—Maricopa Populists nominated several candidates that year, but none of them received more than a handful of votes.5 Local Republicans may well have 45 P o P u l i s t s m a k e t h e i r c a s e a n d t h...