Was the federal government biased against farmers and workers in the late nineteenth century. Why or why not?

Answer 1

I would say yes:

The federal government was biased against farmers and workers in the late 19th century, mostly due to the lack of sympathy for the plight of the worker and to race conflicts. The middle-class citizens felt squeezed by both the big trusts above and the restless immigrant hordes working for cheap labor that came from below. Also, there were many corrupt alliances between big business and the government, which were unsympathetic to the cry of the poor. As for racial conflicts, when Reconstruction ended and the military returned northward, whites once again asserted their power over Blacks. Most Blacks became sharecroppers who provided nothing but labor, but those who could provide their own tools became tenant farmers, a small step up. In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson that "separate but equal" facilities were constitutional; thus "Jim Crow" segregation was legalized. This was also partly caused by friction between the Irish and the Chinese. In San Francisco, Irish-born Denis Kearney incited his followers to terrorize the Chinese. In 1879, Congress passed a bill severely restricting the influx of Chinese immigrants (most of whom were males who had come to California to work on the railroads), but Hayes vetoed the bill only on grounds that it violated an existing treaty with China.