The 1890s marked the tipping point in the turn toward government. In turning to government, particularly the federal government, reformers joined Whiggish Republicans and businessmen, who wanted aid and favors as well as assistance in reining in the era’s destructive competition. Grover Cleveland and the Democratic Party remained the last bastion of localism and small government, but in the crisis of the 1890s even Cleveland turned to the courts and the army to crush labor, over the objections of state and local officials.
