The Progressives

The Progressives Good Politics or Meddlesome Control?

Problems associated with industrialization, immigration and urbanization • Belief that these problems can be addressed and solved • Belief that government is the agency to address these ills • Increased use of scientific theory, formal education, expertise, and use of data Origins of the Progressives

Middle Class • Civic Involvement, $, and Time • Sympathy for the lower classes but not among them • Educated • Across geopolitical boundaries • Across political parties • Grassroots oriented • Exposure of issues needing reform Who were progressives?

Socialism = against • political machines = against • Trusts = against • Consumers protections • voting reforms • working conditions (+child labor and living • Conservation • women’s rights • Federal Reserve System • Prohibition • Income tax Progressive Reforms needed..

Local codes, state regulations • Temperance (eventually national WCTU) • Poverty, Disease • Prostitution Social Progressive Reforms

Margaret Sanger – Educated urban poor about the benefits of family planning through birth control. • Booker T Washington – Trade skills to earn a living • W.E.B. DuBois – founder of NAACP • Muckrakers – members of the press that investigated corruption in order to expose problems to the American people. Social Reformers

Magazines • McClure’s • Collier’s • Newspapers • Books (Newspaper series collected into Books) Muckrakers

Thomas Nast – exposed abuses of the NYC political machine called Tammany Hall and Boss Tweed – used political cartoons Exposing corruption

Ida Tarbell (Standard Oil) • Lincoln Steffens, The Shame of Cities • Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives • Thorstein Veblen, (Conspicuous Consumption) • Upton Sinclair (The Jungle) • "I aimed at the public’s heart and by accident hit its stomach." • *emotive, empathetic, short on policy* Muckrakers

Welfare • Services for the people • Hiram Johnson, Governor of CA • Pingree (DTW) • Jones (TOL) Utilities • To regulate - Water, gas, electricity • Hazen Pingree, Mayor of Detroit • “Golden Rule” Jones - Toledo Woodrow Wilson, Governor of New Jersey Prominent Local Progressives

City Reforms • Settlement houses – workers, professionals, club members could pressure for changes • Jane Addams - created Hull House • Women targeted slums, tenements, wages & hours, child labor, alcohol abuses and prostitution Prominent Local Progressives

17th Amendment – election of senators 1913 • Direct Primary – LaFollette – gives voters more voice in government and limit the political bosses power. By 1916 only 3 states did not have a direct primary • Initiative – citizens propose laws via petitioning, then placed on next election ballot • Referendum – citizens demand a law be “referred” to voters for approval or rejection • Recall – voters able to remove public officials from office Political Reforms start at state level move to federal

Increased regulation of big business • Stronger Anti-Trust Legislation • Maximum Hours and Minimum Wage • Worker’s Compensation (Job Injury) • Worker Safety • SAFETY, SAFETY, SAFETY • Food, drugs, city streets, playgrounds, • Emergence of more modern notion of childhood Economic Progressive Reforms

Cross Political Parties • TR (Republican) • Taft (Republican) • Wilson (Democrat) Progressivism Goes National

TR and the Square Deal Consumers • Meat Inspection Act • Pure Food and Drug Act • Aldrich-Vreeland Act Labor • Anthracite Coal Miner Strike Big Business • Elkins and Heburn Acts • Northern Securities • Good Trust/Bad Trust Environment • National Park Land • MURM • Hetch Hetchy Valley

Taft Presidency Consumers – Society • Payne – Aldrich Tariff Act • Children’s Bureau • 16th Amendment – (income tax) • 17th Amendment – (senate elections) Labor • Created 35,000 postmasters and 20,00 skilled workers in the Navy under civil service protection • Department of Commerce and Labor was divided into 2 departments • 8-Hour workday for government employees Big Business • Mann – Elkins Act • 99 trust busts – prosecutions – including the sugar trust Environment • Put more land into conservation than TR

Wilson – “New Freedom” Consumers Federal Reserve Bank Federal Trade Commission Labor Federal Farm Loan Board Clayton Anti-Trust Act Adamson Act – 8-Hour workday for RR workers Big Business Underwood Simmons Act (lowering tariffs to stop monopolies) Civil Liberties War Industries Board Committee on Public Information Espionage & Sedition Acts

Weaknesses of Reform • Material progress of Americans weakened zeal of reformers • Myriad of Progressive goals were often confusing and contradictory • Opposition to Progressivism apparent as initiatives failed and courts struck down legislation • Government remained mainly under the influence of business and industry • WWI – use of government to create a just society lessens Accomplishments • Trust-busting forced industrialists to notice public opinion • Legislation gave federal and state government the tools to protect consumers • Income tax helped build government revenues and redistribute wealth • Challenged traditional institutions and approaches to domestic problems Evaluation of Progressives

Those not helped Little was done to help migrant farmers or renter farmers or nonunion workers Immigration restriction or literacy tests Imperialism policies to “civilize” underdeveloped nations African Americans and Jim Crow segregation situations Support of women’s suffrage

The Progressives