Progressivism © 2003 Wadsworth Group All rights reserved. Chapter 21.

Progressivism

© 2003 Wadsworth Group All rights reserved.

Chapter 21Chapter 21

Progressivism and the Protestant Spirit

• Progressivism strongest among middle class Protestants

• William Jennings Bryan• Billy Sunday• Walter Rauschenbusch

– Social Gospel

• “Muckrakers”

(c) 2003 Wadsworth Group All rights reserved

Muckrakers, Magazines, and the Turn Toward “Realism”

• “Muckrakers"• Ida Tarbell• Lincoln Steffans• George Kibbe Turner• Muckraking reflected

– Expanded newspaper circulation– Increased interest in “realism”


Increased Newspaper and Magazine Circulation

• Newspaper readership increased 8 fold 1870-1909• McClure's Magazine

– Sam McClure

• Ladies Home Journal• Harper’s• The Atlantic Monthly• More talented people attracted as more wealth is

in journalism industry


The Turn Toward “Realism”

• A way of thinking that valued detachment, objectivity, and skepticism– Muckrakers

• Attempts at creating truer, realistic ways to represent and analyze American society

• Increasing interest in social, political and economic reforms

• Progressivism centered on abuses exposed by Muckrakers


Settlement Houses and Women’s Activism

• Settlement Houses:– Established to assist poor (immigrants) with

city life– A movement inspired mainly by young, middle

class, educated, Protestant women– Sensitivity to social injustices– Rebelled against relegated solely to roles of

wife and mother


Hull House• Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr• Nurseries and other help to working

mothers• Provided cultural events• Florence Kelley• University of Chicago Department of Social

Research: 1st school of Social Work• Hull House widely copied, over 400

settlement houses nationwide


The Cultural Conservatism of Progressive Reformers

• Settlement house workers generally more sympathetic to immigrants than others

• Uncomfortable with emerging sexual revolution– Mann Act

• Women's Christian Temperance Union

• Anti-Saloon League

• Ignored community role of saloons


A Nation of Clubwomen

• Growth of local women’s clubs

• Assumed tasks of social reform

• Made traditional female concerns matters of public policy

• Black clubwomen

• Perspectives on alcoholism and sexuality


Socialism and Progressivism

• Socialism government operation of economic institutions keeps wealthy elite from controlling society

• Socialist Party of America– Eugene V. Debs

• Appeal to Reason• Upton Sinclair

– The Jungle (1906)


The Many Faces of Socialism

• Diversity of Socialists– Immigrants– Native-born farmers and miners in the west

• IWW most radical Socialist group

• Eugene V. Debs and mainstream Socialists

• Victor Berger and Evolutionary Socialists


Socialists and Progressives

• Progressives and Socialists both assume the state can solve economic abuses

• Great deal of cooperation– Progressive lawyer Clarence Darrow defended Socialist

Big Bill Haywood

– John Dewey, Thorstein Veblen, Helen Keller dabbled in Socialism

• Progressives frightened by Socialist talk of revolution


Municipal Reform

• Progressives wanted public ownership of private monopolies providing city services

• Hazen S. Pingree• Carter Harrison, Jr.• Tom Johnson• City Commission and City manager

government


The City Commission Plan

• Galveston, Texas (1900)

• Shifted municipal power from the mayor to 5 city commissioners

• Each commissioner was responsible for a different department of city government


The City Manager Plan

• Sumter, South Carolina (1911)

• City Manager Plan constructed to overcome failures or corruption of the commissioners

• Commissioners continued to set policy

• City Manager was appointed to curtail special agendas


The Costs of Reform

• Dissatisfaction with some municipal reforms– Poor and minority voters felt their influence in

local affairs was weakened by the shift to city commissioners and managers

– Citywide election diluted immigrant and working class vote


Political Reform in the States

• Reform in the cities spread quickly to reform at the state level– State government officials also experienced

corruption and incompetence – Power of lobbyists


Restoring Sovereignty to “The People”

• Direct primary• Seventeenth Amendment (1913)

– Mandated direct election of Senators

• Initiative• Referendum• Recall• Campaign contribution limits


Creating a Virtuous Electorate

• Progressive reformers worked to create responsible electorate who– Understood the importance of the vote

– Resisted manipulation of the electorate

• They also sought to keep the vote from citizens considered corruptible and irresponsible

• Paradox: electorate enlarged to include women, but harder for minorities and poor to vote


The Australian Ballot

• Up until 1890, public voting existed– Vulnerable to corruption, bribery, forces of

persuasion at the ballots– One-party ballots

• 1890: Australian ballot provided for private voting, with choices among the parties


Personal Registration Laws

• 1890-1920: almost every state passed these laws

• Called for voters to register and provide proper identification

• Issues with registration– Made it harder for poor to vote


Disfranchisement

• Immigrants must become citizens to vote

• Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization

• literacy test

• property qualifications

• poll tax

• National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)


Disillusionment with the Electorate

• Walter Lippmann– Drift and Mastery (1914)

• Voter participation rates fall from 79% in 1896 to 49% in 1920


Woman Suffrage

• National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA)– Elizabeth Cady Stanton– Susan B. Anthony– Carrie Chapman Catt

• Western states 1st to grant women right to vote– Women’s gentler nature to tame wild male electorate

• Progressive women suffragists little troubled by racial discrimination

• National Women's Party– Alice Paul

• Nineteenth Amendment (1920)(c) 2003 Wadsworth Group All rights reserved

Economic and Social Reform in the States

• Extension of Progressive Reforms– Limit corporate power– Strengthen organized labor– Offer social welfare protection


Robert LaFollette and Wisconsin Progressivism

• Progressivism strong in Wisconsin• Starts as mobilization against corrupt Republicans• Robert LaFollete• Wisconsin Industrial Commission

– John R. Commons

• "Wisconsin idea"


Progressive Reform in New York

• Charles Evans Hughes

• New York Factory Investigating Committee

• Middle class reformers: Lillian Ward and Louis Brandeis

• Democrats Alfred E. Smith and Robert F. Wagner


A Renewed Campaign for Civil Rights

• New generation of African American activists called for racial equality


The Failure of Accommodationism

• Booker T. Washington– “Accommodation“

• Springfield, Illinois riot (1908)

• W.E.B. DuBois


From the Niagara Movement to the NAACP

• W.E.B. Du Bois– Niagara Movement

• National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)– Beginning of modern Civil Rights Movement– The Crisis– Legal Redress Committee

• National Urban League (1911)


National Reform

• Progressives sought to increase their influence in national politics

• Some problems needed national solution• Establishment of both parties leery of reformers• National Progressive leadership emerged from the

executive branch:– Republican Theodore Roosevelt

– Democrat Woodrow Wilson


The Roosevelt Presidency

• Roosevelt made Vice-President to get him out of New York state politics

• William McKinley (1897-1901)

• Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909)


Regulating the Trusts

• Trust-busting

• Northern Securities Company– J.P. Morgan

• “New Nationalism”


Toward a “Square Deal”

• Anthracite Coal Strike (1902)– United Mine Workers (UMW)

– John Mitchell

– George F. Baer

– Arbitration

• Election of 1904– "Square Deal"

– Alton B. Parker

– Roosevelt aligns Republican Party with reform


Expanding Government Power: The Economy

• Interstate Commerce Commission

• Hepburn Act (1906)

• Pure Food and Drug Act (1906)

• Meat Inspection Act (1906)


Expanding Government Power: The Environment

• Conservation– Preservationists: John Muir and the Sierra Club– Roosevelt: wilderness is a place to test oneself against natural

elements– Conservationists

• Public Lands Commission (1903)• Gifford Pinchot

– National Forest Service

• Roosevelt vs. Old Guard Republicans on government land reserves


Progressivism: A Movement for the People?

• Did Roosevelt alter balance between people and the “interests”?

• Many small competitors of big business driven out by cost of complying with new regulations


The Republicans: A Divided Party

• Panic of 1907 divided Roosevelt reformers and Old Guard conservatives

• Roosevelt committed to overhauling the banking system and the stock market

• Conservative Republicans felt Roosevelt was “radical”

• Roosevelt did not seek re-election


The Taft Presidency

• Roosevelt thought Taft an ideal successor

• Taft– Not adept at politics– More conservative than Roosevelt

• Election of 1908– William Howard Taft – William Jennings Bryan


Taft’s Battles with Congress

• Payne-Aldrich Tariff (1909)

• “Uncle Joe” Cannon


The Ballinger-Pinchot Controversy

• Richard Ballinger

• Gifford Pinchot

• Ballinger questionably sold Alaskan coal deposits

• Taft sides with Ballinger, Roosevelt sides with Pinchot


Roosevelt’s Return• Roosevelt returns to politics• "New Nationalism“ campaign, 1910

– Strong federal government:• Stabilize the economy• Protect the weak• Restore social harmony

– 1910 election results show plan is popular

• Roosevelt challenges Taft for Republican nomination– Denied nomination by Old Guard Republicans


The Bull Moose Campaign

• Progressive Party– “Bull Moosers”

• Hiram W. Johnson


The Rise of Woodrow Wilson

• Academic career

• Congressional Government (1885)

• President of Princeton (1902)

• Governor of New Jersey (1910)

• Anti-Bryan wing of Democratic party

• Social consequences of unregulated Capitalism were repugnant to Christianity


The Election of 1912

• Champ Clark vs. Woodrow Wilson

• 3 Reform candidates vs. Taft– Roosevelt, Wilson, and Eugene Debs

• “New Freedom”

• 3 Reform candidates win 75% of vote


The Wilson Presidency

• Surrounded by talented cabinet officers

• His “image”:– Firmly in charge of his party– Faithful to the people


Tariff Reform and a Progressive Income Tax

• Underwood-Simmons Tariff (1913)

• Sixteenth Amendment (1913)– Right of government to impose income tax


The Federal Reserve Act• Politicians agreed on need to overhaul the nation’s

financial system, disagreed over how• Federal Reserve Act

– Established 12 regional banks, controlled by private banks in the region

– All private banks required to deposit average 6% of assets in the regional Federal Reserve bank

– Reserve was used to make loans to member banks and issue paper currency

– Shore up member banks in distress

• Federal Reserve Board


From the New Freedom to the New Nationalism

• Federal Trade Commission Act (1914)– Federal Trade Commission (FTC)

• Clayton Anti-trust Act• Allows discrimination in some federal offices• Kern-McGillicuddy Act (1916)• Keating-Owen Act (1916)• Adamson Act (1916)• Wilson transforms nation’s reform impulse and agenda

to Democrats


Conclusion

• Progressives’ accomplishments– American concerns with liberty and democracy

could be adapted to an industrialized age

• Suffragism

• Environmental protection

• Transformation of the Presidency

• Accompanying Dangers: bureaucratic elite


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Progressivism © 2003 Wadsworth Group All rights reserved. Chapter 21.

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