Postbellum Rail in Kentucky and Kansas

 

Blog Post-Railroads in Kentucky and Kansas

 

The Civil War brought immense changes to the social, political, and economic landscape of the United States.  America had to heal after four bitter years of war in which brother fought brother, battles had largely destroyed the landscape of the southern states, and the United States saw more deaths than any other war (including non-battle injuries and disease).[1]   In the aftermath of such a terrible conflict, President Lincoln’s vision, also held by his successor, President Johnson, was to heal the nation.  One area which required attention was the economy, and it is important for historians to understand how the economy experienced growth in the postbellum era. 

 

One can measure economic growth in different ways. The 1960s saw a shift in how historians typically had written economic history.  Robert Fogel was one of these new economic historians, and in his work, Railroads and Economic Growth: Essays in Economic History, examines the question of how the economy grew after the Civil War, using railroads as the case study for it.  His research uncovered that, contrary to the commonly held view, railroads were not indispensable to American growth or progress in the postbellum era.  Using cost estimates from 1890 for shipping various agricultural products, he determines that wagon and water transportation, readily available for most of the 19^th century, could have provided a reliable alternative to rail networks during the same period. [2]

 

Fogel’s thesis and work are an important one, based in a macro view of the economy through the lens of railroad growth. However, one can also draw conclusions from a more microeconomic based view.  Accordingly, it is worth examining how the postbellum economy grew by investigating rail in two different border states: Kentucky and Kansas.  The author chose these two states because they were Union states but on the borders of the Civil War, so were not necessarily devastated by war, although certainly effected by it.  Additionally, both had a largely agrarian-based economy during and after the Civil War, so the question of how rail impacted these economies is critical. 

 

Kentucky in the postbellum era (roughly 1865-1900) had a largely agrarian economy, based on wheat and tobacco, particularly in the Bluegrass region surrounding Lexington.  Eastern Kentucky contained and still contains extensive coal deposits.  In the postbellum era, there was much debate about the expansion of railroads in the Bluegrass region of Kentucky.  In his article, “The Railroad Expansion Controversy in Postbellum Bourbon County: Conflicting Economic Interests and Ideological Perspectives Among Urban and Rural Elites,” Charles L. Davis presents the debate over the expansion of the railroad in that region in the 1870s-1890s.  Davis’s article is largely qualitative and narrative, outlining the fierce debate over whether the Bluegrass State should embrace an industrial future, or stick to its agrarian roots.  Each side had its proponents, with the landed gentry opposing further expansion beyond the antebellum established Central Kentucky railroad, while the urban industrial elites wanted to bring more railroads into the state.[3]  These leaders promised a “gospel of prosperity,” resulting from expanded rail in Kentucky.[4]

 

The industrial leaders who supported rail expansion argued that additional rail lines would lower transportation costs for imported goods, create more jobs, and offer a means to export the agricultural products of the region.[5]  In contrast to this, agrarian conservatives such as Cassius M. Clay, Jr. argued that the rail lines would disrupt the local community, its autonomy, and local control over wealth. 

 

An 1885 referendum on funding an expanded rail line through Bourbon County passed with 57.3 percent in favor and 45.8 percent opposed, however, it only had a majority vote in the city of Paris (the county seat).  Outside city limits, it failed, and an 1876 act required the passage of any referendum in both Paris and the surrounding county.  Legal fights in court ensued, and the court ultimately struck the referendum down.[6]  However, another referendum in 1887 passed without any contention, perhaps because the Kentucky Central Railroad’s public image had suffered by that time due to corruption.  Other causes may be the fact that, with the passage of time, the industrialists seemed to be correct about the advantages of additional rail lines.[7]  In any case, the passed referendum demonstrates that, by the 1880s, Bourbon County was willing to expand rail networks and take a gamble on their utility.  The rail lines seem to have increased access to markets both for the import and export of goods from the region, but it is hard to quantify, as Fogel did, its overall economic impact on the region.  The expansion of railroads also impacted Kansas economy in the postbellum era. 

 

Kansas saw much of the same arguments that Kentucky did regarding the expansion of rail, although the antagonism between farmers and railroad promoters there was based in the idea that the railroad was a public utility which must be accessible to all, and that railroad owners abused employees and charged excessively for freight.[8]  As in Kentucky, Kansas towns funded railroad construction and land values increased as railroads expanded.  Additionally, rail lines brought immigrants to Kansas and enabled farmers to ship their goods back to markets in Kansas City and farther east.[9] 

 

However, Populists held that the railroad was a public utility, controlled by the public, rather than a corporation solely based on profit, and that the public should have a say in setting rates.[10]  Kansas Populists also argued for nationalization of the railroads towards this end.[11] 

 

The Populist Party in Kansas did have an impact on policy matters regarding rail in the state, however it did not stop the expansion of rail in Kansas. In the year 1890, Kansas had more miles of rail than all the states of New England, with over 8,700 miles in Kansas, lagging only behind Illinois at that time.  The economic impact of rail in Kansas is evident by this expansion during the period.[12]

 

 

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[1] “America’s Wars,” Factsheet, Department of Veterans Affairs, Accessed 2 September 2022, https://www.va.gov/opa/publications/factsheets/fs_americas_wars.pdf

[2] Jeffrey G. Williamson, “Reviewed Work (s): Railroads and American Economic Growth: Essays in Economic History by Robert Fogel Williams,” Economic Development and Cultural Change 14, no. 1 (Oct., 1965): 109, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1152312

[3] Charles L. Davis, “The Railroad Expansion Controversy in Postbellum Bourbon County: Conflicting Economic Interests and Ideological Perspectives Among Urban and Rural Elites,” The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 112, no. 1 (Winter 2014), 53, https://www.jstor.org/stable/24641120

[4] Ibid, 54.

[5] Ibid, 57.

[6] Ibid, 72.

[7] Ibid, 74-75.

[8] Thomas Frank, “The Leviathan with Tentacles of Steel: Railroads in the Minds of Kansas Populists,” Western Historical Quarterly 20, no. 1 (Feb., 1989), 38, https://www.jstor.org/stable/968474

[9] Ibid, 40.

[10] Ibid, 46.

[11] Ibid, 47-48.

[12] “Kansas Railroads,” Scientific American 63, no 1 (July 5, 1890), 7., https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/26101287