18. Railroads, Business, and Politics in the Gilded Age, 1865

Quiz for Making Historical Arguments: Social Darwinism: Did Wealthy Industrialists Practice What They Preached?

Select the best answer for each question. Click the “submit” button for each question to turn in your work.

1. Social Darwinism resonated with businessmen during the Gilded Age because

it suggested that their industrialism benefitted and hastened human progress.

Darwin prescribed scientific business practices to implement in the United States.

it justified their reliance on inexpensive immigrant labor in their factories.

Darwin expressed his admiration for competition between corporations.

2. Why did Andrew Carnegie invite Herbert Spencer to Pittsburgh?

To debate the philosophical and pragmatic merits of Spencer’s “survival of the fittest” theory

To collaborate on a new book about the law of evolution as applied to business

To show off how successfully he had applied Spencer’s evolutionary theories in the steel industry

To convince Spencer that American industries were superior to British industries

3. Although Andrew Carnegie and William Sumner both supported social Darwinism, the difference between the two men was that Sumner

did not admire the writings of Herbert Spencer.

strongly opposed the U.S.’s protective tariffs.

supported government regulation in some circumstances.

distinguished between state and federal government intervention.

4. Most wealthy industrialists’ support for laissez-faire seemed to disappear when the government proposed new

taxes.

business regulations.

tariffs.

constitutional amendments.

5. The evidence presented in this essay supports which of the following historical arguments?

Social Darwinism was more successfully executed in the steel industry than in other major American industries.

The McKinley tariff was the catalyst that made Carnegie and Sumner agree on the principles of social Darwinism.

American industrialists applied social Darwinist principles to their businesses more consistently than British industrialists.

Industrialists in the Gilded Age only supported social Darwinism when it benefitted their companies’ bottom line.