People often consider the Gilded Age to be the epitome of American industrialization and expansion, but if someone was to strip away the fluff and nonesense of this era, they would find that hatred fueled the GIlded Age just as much as the rapid economic expansion. Particularly with European immigrants, who were trying to make good our promise of the "American Dream," they were met were met with equal amount of hatred and unwelcome.

The settlement of the West was highly advertised oversees, and led many people to uproot their lives and come to America for the chance at land and a better life, particularly for Russians, German, Italians, Irish, and British people. In Great Britain and Ireland, the Great amine ravaged the islands from the 1840's until 1852. In Italy, the exile of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1815 let the former French controlled region shattered when the Congress of Vienna broke it up into the Papal States, and the Kingdoms of Lombardy-Venetia, Sardinia, and the Two Sicilies. The War of Italian Unification lasted from roughly 1815 until Rome was conquered in 1871, and made the capitol of the new Kingdom of Italy. In Germany, the Holy Roman Empire was conquered by Napoleon in 1807, and the Congress of Vienna established the German Confederation with the Emperor of Austria at the helm, with all protest and revolution promptly being squashed. So when Otto von Bismark became the Prussian Minister President in 1862, the Prussian victory in the Austro-Prussian War led to the establishment of the Northern German Federation, which pushed Austria out of the equation. And with French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, Germany became the largest power in Europe and the Prussian Hohenzollern princes became emperor's and ruled from the new capital of Berlin. In Russia, Czar Alexander II (1881-1892) shut Russia off from the rest of Europe and taught that the citizens should fear the freedom of speech and press, constitution, and Parliament; and Nicholas II (1892-1917) oversaw the last of the Russian Empire with the Bloody Sunday Massacre in 1905, when a group led by a priest came to the Winter Palace to petition the Czar and were promptly slaughtered, and the Bolshevik Revolution which led to his abdication in 1917 and eventual execution two years later.

Compelled by these harsh circumstances, the promise of the "American Dream" seemed heaven sent. But these people had almost nothing in their homeland, and came here with even less. So when they came to New York and were hit with the realization that train tickets and necessary equipment cost money they didn't have, so they often settled in the city where they landed and found an abundance of jobs under people like Carnegie, Rockerfeller, and Vanderbilt. For the British immigrants, who were mostly white, Anglo-Saxon protestants, they had the very real possibility of being promoted to middle-class position. But for Catholics (Irish, Italians, and Germans) and non-English speakers (Germans, Italians, and Russians), they discovered the epitome of Gilded age paradoxes- Social Darwinism. During this period, which was politically and culturally dominated by Christianity- a religion of love, forgiveness, and hope- Social Darwinism came to be known as the driving force of the era. With its messages of "the amount of money you have is a measure of how much God loves you" and "If you are born poor you have no hope to rise above your circumstances," this provides a stark contrast to the forgiving nature of the religion that was held by so many people that followed this social ideology, especially the cream of the crop such as Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Vanderbilt, the very people who ruled over their employees like gods and essentially ran the country in place of the government, as in the case of J. P. Morgan, who bailed the country out on several occassions.

Along the line there have been many twists and turns, mountains and valleys. As far as Constitutionally, the era of the mid-late 1800's was one of those low points. But it was also a period of turnover, as the old ideals died away and gave rise to the Progressive era of the 1900's-1920's. It may have been an era of contradictions, such as horrible conditions behind the mask of economic progress, but sometimes these things are necessary to learn and protect others from making those mistakes. For instance, when Theodore Roosevelt took the presidency in 1901, one of the first things he did was going after the magnates who held the monopolies and breaking up the trusts that dominated their industries, ensuring that everyone had more of a fair chance.

When you shine a light in the darkness, you may see some awful things. But you are also giving hope, for you are providing a light at the end of the tunnel.