THE ORIGINS OF PROGRESSIVISM

Warm Up • Please read the excerpt from Upton

Sinclair’s ‘The Jungle’

• After reading the article, what are three concerns you have about the meatpacking industry in the early 1900s?

The Progressive Era• 1895 -1920• Middle class movement, those

above are abusing the system & those below will become a socialist threat

• Gov’t needed to be the agency of human welfare

Roots of ProgressivismA. Jane Addams (Hull House) Starts

settlement house movementB. Protestant clergymen –”Social Gospel” –

Christian Socialistsi. Post-millenialism (must perfect society

before the second coming)

C. Greenback Labor Party (1870s) & Populist Party (1890’s) demanded gov’t intervention

D. Excesses of the monopolies & trusts

GOALS OF PROGRESSIVISM Progressive organizations were

separate movements that worked independently to solve various societal problems

Each worked to one of the following:

1) Protect social welfare2) Promote moral improvement3) Create economic reform4) Foster efficiency

PROTECTING SOCIAL WELFARE Out of the religious community a new

social gospel was preached Josiah Strong Walter Rauschenbusch ‘Theology of the Social Gospel’

(1917) WASP culture has a moral imperative to

spread the values of civil liberty & Christianity *

Its message was religious groups should work to help the poor

The Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) The Salvation Army

Instructed poor immigrants in middle class values of hard work and temperance

 www.archives.gov January 15, 2014 

The Declaration of Independence: A TranscriptionIN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offencesFor abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:Column 1Georgia:   Button Gwinnett   Lyman Hall   George WaltonColumn 2North Carolina:   William Hooper   Joseph Hewes   John PennSouth Carolina:   Edward Rutledge   Thomas Heyward, Jr.   Thomas Lynch, Jr.   Arthur MiddletonColumn 3Massachusetts:John HancockMaryland:Samuel ChaseWilliam PacaThomas StoneCharles Carroll of CarrolltonVirginia:George WytheRichard Henry LeeThomas JeffersonBenjamin HarrisonThomas Nelson, Jr.Francis Lightfoot LeeCarter BraxtonColumn 4Pennsylvania:   Robert Morris   Benjamin Rush   Benjamin Franklin   John Morton   George Clymer   James Smith   George Taylor   James Wilson   George RossDelaware:   Caesar Rodney   George Read   Thomas McKeanColumn 5New York:   William Floyd   Philip Livingston   Francis Lewis   Lewis MorrisNew Jersey:   Richard Stockton   John Witherspoon   Francis Hopkinson   John Hart   Abraham ClarkColumn 6New Hampshire:   Josiah Bartlett   William WhippleMassachusetts:   Samuel Adams   John Adams   Robert Treat Paine   Elbridge GerryRhode Island:   Stephen Hopkins   William ElleryConnecticut:   Roger Sherman   Samuel Huntington   William Williams   Oliver WolcottNew Hampshire:   Matthew Thornton

Muckrakers• Magazine publishers make money off exposing

ills of society• McClure's, Cosmopolitan, Colliers• Term coined by Theodore Roosevelt

• John Spargo –’The Bitter Cry of Children’• Jacob Riis –’How the Other Half Lives’• Ida Tarbell –’The History of the Standard Oil Company’• Upton Sinclair –’The Jungle’• Licoln Steffens –’Shame of the Cities’

AP PARTS

Municipal, State & National Reform

A. Progressives believed that one could solve social problems by taking control of elections & law making

B. Initiative, Referendum, RecallC. Laws to limit political gifts; no free rail passesD. Direct elections of Senators to avoid

‘millionaire’s club’E. Public commissioner and city manager who are

hired, not elected –Galveston, TX flood of 1900F. Western states need federal intervention in water

rights issuesG. Stop monopolies at city level –stop selling

streetcars & utilities to private companies w/o regulation

REFORMING STATE GOVERNMENTA key individual that

proposed many voting reforms was Governor Robert La Follette of WisconsinCongressman, Senator,

1924 candidate for president

Recall & referendumState legislatures to

require direct primaries for each party to select a candidate –before party bosses controlled candidate selection

‘Fighting Bob’ La Follette

REFORMING NATIONAL GOVERNMENT

16th Amendment (1912) individual income tax Elimination of tax breaks for corporations

Creation of the Federal Reserve (1913)The most significant reform at the national level

was the 17th Amendment (1913) Senators were chosen by state legislatures, not the

people

Progressive Presidents

• Theodore Roosevelt – “Square Deal” for all Americans

A.Control Corporations1. Trustbusting -1st railroads Northern

Securities Co. v. US, 1903; brings 43 other indictments

2. 1902 Coal Strike3. Hepburn Act, 1906 –regulate interstate

railroads b/c ICC didn’t have enough power

B. Consumer Protection1. Pure Food and Drug Act –labeling

C. Conservation of Natural Resources1. John Muir; Gifford Pinchot2. Newlands Act –federal lands sold to pay for western

irrigation3. Implementation of National Parks laws -125 mil. Acres

saved4. Balance corporate interests w/nature –Sierra Club

ECONOMIC REFORMAmerican Railway Union leader

Eugene V. Debs organized the American Socialist Party

Organized the Pullman Strike of 1894 After arrest became anti-capitalistic Advocated that workers could use elections

to gain control of gov’t, thus businessIn Re Debs –SC ruled that the

federal gov’t could intervene in intrastate & interstate commerce to limit strikes

With Daniel De Leon founded in 1905 the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)

PROMOTING MORALITYimproving the lives of the poor through

improving personal behaviorProhibitionIn 1874, the Woman’s Christian

Temperance Union (WCTU) was foundedFrances WillardCarrie Nation

Anti-Saloon League was founded in 1895 as the “Church in action against the Saloon” worked to pass laws to have alcohol banned

and lawbreakers punished created tensions with many immigrant

groups

PROTECTING SOCIAL WELFARE

Florence Kelley advocate for improving the lives of

women and children founded the National Consumers League,

which organized boycotts of goods produced by children

helped win passage of the Illinois Factory Act in 1893

It was the first law that prohibited child labor under the age of 14

Muller v. Oregon, 1908 Limits women’s work day

*Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, 1911 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdNYqBP_5q4

Women’s RightsA. Western states pass suffrage firstB. Challenging the ‘female sphere’C. ‘New Women’ –for the middle class the home is

no longer an all consuming placeD. Women’s ClubsE. Carrie Chapman Catt

A. National American Women’s Suffrage Assoc. (NAWSA); precursor to League of Women Voters

F. Alice Paul• National Women’s Party (off-shoot of NAWSA)• sought a Constitutional suffrage Amendment• Later Equal Rights AmendmentG.Margaret Sanger

founded Planned Parenthood Provided contraceptives to women

wrote ‘Motherhood in Bondage’

Three Models Black Leadership

• Booker T. Washington• Tuskegee Institute, 1888• Economic advancement before political

advancement• ‘Atlanta Compromise Speech’ (1895)

• W.E.B. Du Bois• Niagara Movement (1905)• NAACP (1910)• Immediate political, social & economic

equality• Marcus Garvey

• Pan-Africanism, Universal Negro Improvement Association(UNIA)

African Americans in the Progressive Era

• Post-Civil War Era• 13th, 14th, 15th Amendments passed, but not consistently

honored (14th/15th)• Reconstruction ends too soon (Tilden-Hays

Compromise of 1877)• Economic disadvantages

• Sharecropping• Crop lien system

• Rise of segregation –Plessy v. Ferguson• Republicans are the party of African Americans, but

do little to protect suffrage• 30% of blacks in the south were illiterate in 1900

AP PARTS

The Chink in the Republican Armor• Panic of 1907• Industrial capacity had outrun

domestic and foreign consumption• Rampant speculation & unregulated

banking

• Industrialists blamed TR’s ‘trustbusting’; TR countered that more regulation was needed

• JP Morgan saves the day, but makes deal w/TR

• Expands power of US Steel w/purchase of the Tennessee Coal & Iron Co.

• Conservative Republicans withdraw support

Taft – the ‘bigger’ trustbuster

• 90 indictments’ BUT• Becomes an enemy of TR & splits

Republican party due to:• Ballinger-Pinchot scandal• Payne-Aldrich Tariff (1909)

• Raises most tariffs• Free trade w/ Philippines

• Ultimately loses 1910 Congressional election & presidency

• TR responds w/‘new Nationalism’

Wilson’s New Freedom• Assault on the triple wall of privilege

A. Tariffs –Underwood Tariff bill, graduated income tax revenue

A. Graduated income tax

B. Banking –Federal Reserve Act of 1913A. Result of 1907 PanicB. 12 regional banks run by gov’t, $ supply easily

increased/decreased

C. Trusts –Clayton Anti-trust Act of 1914 A. Allows for labor protest –helps unionsB. Tries to stop shell companies of trustsC. Inspired by Louis Brandeis -‘Other People’s Money’

(1913) -Curse of bigness –competition needed, trusts threaten freedom

D. Federal Trade Commission Act, 1914

http://blogs.princeton.edu/graphicarts/wilsoncaric.html

Immigration Reform

A. ‘Stem the tide’ –overcrowding, unemployment, alcoholism

A. Immigrants must assimilateB. Eugenics

A. Science of altering the reproduction process of flora, fauna

B. Forced sterilization –Carnegie FoundationC. Nativism

A. Madison Grant ‘The Passing of the Great Race’B. Senator William Dillingham

SFI ScrambleExtending Democracy &

reforming Gov’tGrowing Power of

CorporationsWomen’s Suffrage

Immigration Foreign policy Consumer Protection & Conservation