Hard money

Grant's second term began with an economic disaster that rendered thousands of northern laborers both jobless and homeless. In 1873 overspeculation by financiers and overbuilding by industry and railroads led to widespread failures and depression. Debtors on the farm and in the cities sought an inflationary , easy-money solution by demanding greenback paper money that was not supported by gold. In 1874, Grant finally decided to side with the hard-money bankers and creditors who wanted a stable money supply backed by gold and vetoed a bill calling for the release of additional greenbacks.

Hayes-Tilden standoff

By 1876, federal troops had been withdrawn from all but three southern states- South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana . The Democrats had returned to power in all ex-confederate states except these. This fact would play a key role in the presedential election of 1876. The republicans nominated Rutherford B. Hayes and the Democrats chose New York's reform governor , Samuel J. Tilden. When the popular voted were counted , the democrats had won a clear majority and expected Tilded to be put in the white house. In three southern states , however, the returns were contested. To win the election , Tilden needed one more electoral vote from either South Carolina, Florida, or Louisiana. A special electoral commission was created to determine who was entitled to the disputed votes of the three states. In the party vote all of the electoral votes were given to Hayes, the republican. Outraged democrats threatened to filibuster the results and send the election to the house of rep. , which they controlled.

Whiskey Ring

In the United States, the Whiskey Ring was a scandal, exposed in 1875, involving diversion of tax revenues in a conspiracy among government agents, politicians, whiskey distillers, and distributors.
Before they were caught, a group of mostly Republican politicians were able to steal off millions of dollars in federal taxes on liquor; the scheme involved an extensive network of bribes involving distillers, rectifiers, gaugers, storekeepers, and internal revenue agents.The Whiskey Ring was seen by many as a sign of corruption under the Republican governments that took power across the nation following the American Civil War. General Orville E. Babcock, the private secretary to the President, was indicted as a member of the ring — for this reason, President Ulysses S. Grant, although not directly involved in the ring, came to be seen as part of the Republican corruption.The Whiskey Ring scandal, along with other alleged abuses of power by the Republican party, contributed to national weariness of Reconstruction, which ended after Grant's presidency with the Compromise of 1877.

Tweed Ring

The postwar era was filled with corruptness and was polluted with indecency. The infamous Tweed Ring in New  York city vividly displayed these lack of ethics that were typical of the age. Burly Boss Tweed employed bribery, graft, and fraudulent elections to get as much as $200 million . He dispensed jobs and contracts in return for political support and bribes. Tweed was later discovered and imprisoned by Samuel J. Tilden , a New York attorney. Tweed was eventually put behind bars and died in jail.

Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)

The Jim Crow laws of the south legalized systematic segregation; the Supreme Court validated this in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson; it ruled that "separate but equal" facilities were constitutional under the 14th amendment; however the facilities for the African-Americans were far from equal to that of the whites; this inequality would remain in place for nearly a century.

Kearnyites

a group started in San Francisco by Irish-born Denis Kearny; he urged his followers to violently abuse the Chinese immigrants; many Kearnyites were recently arrived European immigrants who disliked the competition for cheap labor caused by the Chinese immigrants; they terrorized Chinese immigrants by cutting off their pigtails & sometimes murdered them; part of the cause of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882

"cheap money"

When hard times hit in 1873, the issue of "hard money" vs "cheap money" came about; advocates of cheap money wanted the government to reissue greenbacks; they were hard hit farmers and debtors who reasoned that more money meant cheaper money, which meant easier-to-pay debts; "cheap money" would cause inflation, while "hard money" would cause deflation