114: The Political Reconstruction of American Tobacco
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114: The Political Reconstruction of American Tobacco
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About this listen
In this episode of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era Podcast, Boyd Cothran talks with historian Patrick O’Connor about his new book, The Political Reconstruction of American Tobacco, 1862–1933.
Rather than treating tobacco primarily as a moral problem or a corporate success story, O’Connor approaches it as a window onto the making of the modern American state. Beginning with Civil War–era taxation and moving through the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, the conversation traces how tobacco became deeply embedded in federal governance—through revenue collection, market regulation, inspection and classification regimes, agricultural science, and expert bureaucracy.
Along the way, we discuss how taxation helped create national markets, how “quality” and knowledge functioned as forms of power, how growers were disciplined through debt and market institutions, and how Progressive Era expertise reshaped both agriculture and state capacity. The episode also reflects on why tobacco proved so difficult to regulate or dismantle in the early twentieth century—and what this history can tell us about the long-standing challenges of governing harmful but profitable commodities.
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