Cecil’s Column: Is “The Wizard of Oz” a satire … – CK Dexter Haven
I was looking through bored.com and found this site among the other links. I was browsing through when I came across an article that dealt with the Wizard of OZ and the Populist movement. The explanation was good, but to fully understand the film, one must first understand the Populist movement itself.
It all started out in the western plains. After we murdered and herded the Native American tribes that lived there first, there was quite a population explosion out there, thanks to the Homestead Act. The soil, although hard, was extremely fertile from years and years of billions of buffalo doing their buisness all over the place. The farmers were able to produce massive quantities of crops, and this became a large problem.
The excess created a severe depression in the agricultural market. This, combined with the end of a thirteen year cycle of heavy rain and punishing weather screwed the farmers over pretty badly.
The farmers did not consider their line of work subject to oscilations in the buisness cycle, bad luck, or over production. They believed that they were good, honest men that made an honest living, so it could not possibly be their fault. According to the common farmer, the devil causing this mayhem was eastern trust and the industrial capitalism that came with it. They also blamed immigrants for some of their problems.
The farmers began to protest! They claimed that the retail prices in the east were too high, and that the people were not consuming enough. To combat this, they went after the grain elevators and the railroads. To do this, Oliver Hudson Kelly founded the National Grange and Patrons of Husbandry in 1867. The idea was to rally political power to get things done for the farmers. They also pooled resources to buy their own grain elevators and buy all the equipment they needed instead of paying middlemen for their services.
That took care of the big threat of greedy grain elevator operators, and next in line were the railorads. Now, they realised that there was no way to compete with the massive RR companies, so they attempted to have legislation passed in their favor. A court case, Munn v. Illinois decided the matter, and the farmers won. The prize was a maximum rate which the railroads could charge.
The Populists became a political party, and in 1892 they made a bid for the executive office running on the Omaha Platform. Among other ideas it proposed, some of the big ones were a graduated income tax and more money to be placed in circulation. The most important point of this platform was the free and unlimited coinage of silver! James B Weaver ran for the Populists and gained three states, I believe this is the best any third party has ever done.
He loses for three main reasons. First, Gompers, the fearless leader of the American Federation of Labor, was extremely hostile of anything that did not get his workers more money. Why does this matter? It matters because the union is extremely powerful and consists of most of the eastern city population. Second, the immigrants all voted in blocks. The bosses and Tweeds controlled the immigrant vote, and they liked others more than the populists. Third is the African American vote. African Americans voted Republican no matter what in that time period. They remember the Democrats who enslaved them, and they’re not about to vote for them and the Populists had nothing in the Omaha Platform to help them.
In 93, they try again, but lose after Williams Jennings Bryan, the best public speaker of the age, defects to the Democrats. The Democrats also steal the silver standard idea. The Democrats and the Populists both lose, silver is out and gold is now on top for good. This shatters the Populists and pretty much renders them powerless.
Whew, long story! Now for what it means for OZ!!!
Each character represents something in this story, Dorothy represents the innocent farm children from Kansas, Scarecrows the the Kansas farmers, the Tin Man represents the dehumanization of modern labor and eastern labor. The Lion is our friend W. J. Bryan! The monkeys are actually not Native Americans, they are exploited labor. The guards of the witch are the Native Americans. The good western witch sends snow, the snow means rain, and rain always comes from the West in the plains. The wizard is any one of the dud presidents of the late 1800s and early 1900s, he is not really that important when you realise he is just a man behind a curtain! Big buisness ran the country then, most certainly not the president. Bauhm shows us that all that is needed to be a president is to appear to be all things to all people. The movie does not show this, but in the book every character sees the wizard as something different.
Water kills the witch for obvious reasons. She is from the East, remember the whole eastern capitalism thing I mentioned earlier. Water saves crops and would lessen the sting of eastern capitalism. As for OZ itself, it can be two cities. O comes after N and Z comes after Y…NY, it can also mean DC if you want to link it with the wizard himself first. I believe it is NY because New York is the capitalism capitol of the US, contains Wall St.(which was created primarily because of railroads), and has control over the market. Those nifty emerald glasses are simply an allusion to the Chicago World Fair.
First and foremost, the story is childrens literature!!! The characters are definatly drawn on characters in the Populist era. Bauhm shows the American desire for symbols of fulillment and reveals that our real needs lie elsewhere. If you have any little questions feel free to email me. There and many, many little hints in the film. If anyone wants some more interesting information about The Wizard of OZ, you can email me at:
Well, its over! My head is full of this useless information and I figured that somebody might want to know this. Peace!