10 Days That Unexpectedly Changed America

The overarching theme running throughout 10 Days that Unexpectedly Changed America is change and reform. The terms change and reform are not synonymous: In Gillon’s work, change refers to the transformation of American life or culture, while reform refers to an alteration of American policy.

Although change often simply reflects the passage of time, in the book it appears most prominently in the chapters dealing with events taking place during and just after the second industrial revolution. Technological changes tend to illuminate societal fault lines, often leading to dramatic confrontations. For example, as steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie attempted to take advantage of the economic transformation that came from “a growing population, the development of new inventions, the expansion of the railroads, and the emergence of a national marketplace that kindled customer demand” (111), pressure built up that resulted in the Homestead strike of 1892. Similarly, Gillon describes America in 1901 as a nation “in transition from a rural, agricultural past to an urban, industrial future” (126)—industrialization, urbanization, and mass immigration created problems such as congestion, cultural conflict, crime, and a growing wealth gap. Finally, in the 1920s, “dazzling technological changes were transforming the way Americans lived and worked, forcing a confrontation between old values and new realities” (150), creating a new national culture through shared mass communication such as films, radio, and newspapers, while technologies like telephones, automobiles, and highway development allowed Americans to “establish a wider sense of community” for the first time (151). These changes created a moral conflict between the nation’s rural, isolated cultural past and its cosmopolitan cultural future.

Reform is a factor in several of the events covered in the book and can most prominently be seen in Shay’s Rebellion and in the presidency of Teddy Roosevelt. Shays’ Rebellion took place as the result of a debt crisis in New England, which was itself a result of the weakness of the Articles of Confederation, the nation’s initial frame of government. After the protesting farmers made their case that the existing tax policy was indeed unfair, a new Constitutional Convention was called, and a new Constitution was written and ratified. The event marked one of the first times when policy changed to reflect the will of the common people. Massive political and social reforms also took place in the United States just after the turn of the 20th century. In a transitional era when industrialization and urbanization drastically changed how people lived and worked, progressive reforms were the direct result of Theodore Roosevelt assuming the presidency following the assassination of William McKinley. McKinley had governed as a staunch conservative who installed policies favorable to industry. Roosevelt, on the other hand, used his office to force needed economic and social reforms, curbing monopolies, regulating industries, and preserving wilderness. Gillon argues that “Teddy Roosevelt’s accidental presidency, made possible by an assassin’s bullet, profoundly changed the course of the century” (137).