2. Why did people support the Populist Party?

The People's Party was able to exploit a huge gap in the political market place left by the two main parties. In the late nineteenth century, there didn't appear to be too many significant differences between the Democrats and the Republicans, both of which were broadly committed to similar policies. Yet in the 1890s, at the height of what became known as "The Gilded Age," many people, especially farmers in the South and Midwest, looked for a radically different approach that would address the concerns of those left behind by the rapid development of America's increasingly industrialized economy.