Reply #28: Well, it boils down to this:

[Betty Karlson]

In the aftermath of the American civil war, America needed to reinvent itself. Or rather, it needed to reinvent its core values. The South was held down, was disadvantaged, was denied any opportunity to exit the union, flagrant racism sprang up (KKK as its ugliest face), and there was a need for an explanation how so much distrust and inequality could be geld together. The only thing the war had brung about was the emancipation of African-Americans and of veterans. They were the ones for whom class had come to mean less and less.

Just as all those Southern States were about to re-enter the union (or had just done so), Grant was elected. - That is the man who had led the North to military victory. So his presidency would come to define the new core values all of America held in common. The awkward situation had been brought about by the war, but the respinse would be brought about by Grant's administration.

Politically, Grant was beholden to two philosophies:
1) The North had won through its economic superiority (partly brought about by bloccades of the South's economy) - so the North's economic philosophy, aggressive capitalism, would define his presidency.
2) His veterans needed welfare for their past services. So arbitrary decissions to benefit the veterans would define his economic policies as well. Now that the South would cease to be a target for plundering, it should remain a target for brutal entrepreneurs from the north.

The result was a toxic cocktail of less oversight and less normative standards. The Grant administration, according to Kinder and Hilgemann, was the United States' darkest time of corruption.
But as it profited the North (the veterans), and as the North was culturally dominant (the South's economy had just been upturned; there was no money to be culturally dominant), and as Grant had the status of a hero (the slaves were free at last!), nothing was done against him. Rather, the myth came to be (under influence of new theories like darwinism) that the North was dominant and the South subdued, because of a quality only the north possessed: the American Dream. That is: grab what you can and dare to speculate with it. No holds barred, free for all, if you lose you're a loser. Anyone can succeed - and if you don't it's your own fault.

This is a rather unflattering presentation of the American Dream. In laer years, America has been a beacon of opportunity to many, and the new core value (the land of opportunity) worked as a true melting pot.
But, as with any system, those who profited from it tried to exclusivate their position by denying to others what they had enjoyed themselves. If you look for the moment America stopped to essentially be a land of opportunity, look for the moment the melting pot stopped melting.
And the American Dream could be exclusivated becourse of an undercurrent it had had from the beginning: that aggressive capitalism was there to serve a limited group of men. And that if the civil war had been fought on your behalf, you should be gratefull not to be a slave and let the veterans' decendants have their exclusive opportunities.

(Sorry if I rant a lot in this post. Having sipped some alcohol, I am not in the mood for subtlety)