I think what the American people did for expanding the west was not a very good Idea. They moved the railroad way to fast for production, and because of this these railroads drove up the prices. Not only that, they treated the Indian people horribly, they gave them almost no freedom which caused them to attack the people building the railroad, and they killed the lifeblood of the Native American people, which was buffalo to almost extinction. Then because of this crazy fast rail road expansion, bussiness's started opening all over the place, with not enough customers and, to send goods across the country was too expensive because the railroads had to pay off their debts, and had monopolys of the rail roads to control prices. This led to the farmers going bankrupt and creating the Populism idea that the high bankers and wall street gurus created this problem by them having too much power, and expanding the west too fast. Creating a vicious cycle, that the populism idea is still continued on today.