the progressive era to what extent did the united states become more democratic during the...

The Progressive Era• To what extent did the United States

become more democratic during the Progressive Era?

• In what ways did the responsibilities of the federal government grow during this time of reform?

• To what extent did the Progressive Era successfully address the economic, political, and social problems of the Gilded Age?

CAUSES

Growth of Industry

Growth of Cities

THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT

(1900-1920)

EFFECTS

Political Social Economic

Presidents and Themes

POLITICAL REFORMS

1) Extend or protect political rights of previously disenfranchised groups

2) Are intended to make public officials more accountable to the public

3) Attack corruption and abuses of power by public officials.

POLITICAL EFFECTS

• Political reforms: - secret ballots- initiative, referendum, and recall- direct primaries- 17th amendment= direct election of

senators- 19th amendment= women’s suffrage

• Decline of machine politics

• Split in Republican Party, 1912

SOCIAL REFORMS

Reforms that seek to protect and promote the

human and social rights of deprived groups in society.

SOCIAL EFFECTS

• Laws protecting workers

• Settlement houses and social work (Jane Addams)

• Prohibition (18th amendment)

• Birth control for women (Margaret Sanger)

• Beginning of a movement for civil rights for African Americans (W.E. B. Du Bois & Booker T. Washington)

ECONOMIC REFORMS

Reforms that seek to control corporate

behavior and check the abuses practiced by large

corporations.

ECONOMIC EFFECTS

• Regulation of big business

• Lower tariffs

• Reformed banking system

• Conservation of land and water

• 16th amendment=federal income tax

PROGRESSIVE ERA PRESIDENTS

• Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909)Republican

• William Howard Taft (1909-1913)Republican

• Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921)Democrat

3 Main Goals of the Progressive Movement

1. Make the government more democratic (more power in the hands of the people)

2. Ameliorate the effects of industrialization

3. Rein in the corporations through government regulation of big business

IMPORTANT THEMESor “BIG IDEAS” in US History

Increasing the power of the federal government

US becoming more democratic

What group of people brought the problems of industrialization and urbanization to the

attention of the American people?

How did they do it?

Muckrakers were investigative journalists who exposed the “underside”

of American life.

____

Muckrakers exposed a variety of problems ranging from political

corruption to child labor and the abuses of big business.

Notable Muckrakers

• Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives (1889)

• Lincoln Steffens, Shame of the Cities (1904)

• Ida Tarbell, History of the Standard Oil Company (1904)

• John Spargo, Bitter Cry of the Children (1906)

• Upton Sinclair, The Jungle (1906)

Jacob Riis1849-1914

Photojournalist who believed that the “poor were the victims rather than the makers of their fate."

How the Other Half Lives, an illustrated account of city life, was published in 1889 and brought the problems of urbanization to the attention of city leaders including Theodore Roosevelt.

<http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAriis.htm>

Long ago, it was said that “one half the world does not know how the other half lives.” That was true then. It did not know because it did not care. The half that was on top cared little for the struggles and less for the fate of those who were underneath, so long as it was able to hold them there and keep its own seat. There came a time when the discomfort and crowding below was so great, and consequent upheavals so violent, that it was no longer an easy thing to do, and then the upper half fell to inquiring what was the matter. Information on the subject has been accumulating rapidly since, and the whole world has its hands full answering for its old ignorance.

Street Arabs in Night-quarters,

Mulberry Street,

c. 1890, lantern slide, Museum of the City

of New York,

The Jacob A. Riis Collection, 90.13.2.9

Organized Charity, Outdoor School

(for children with tuberculosis)

c. 1890, lantern slide, Museum of the City

of New York,

The Jacob A. Riis Collection, 90.13.2.44

Children's Playground in Poverty,

c. 1890, hand-colored lantern slide, Museum of the City of New York,

The Jacob A. Riis Collection, 90.13.2.69

A Flat in the Pauper's Barracks with All Its Furniturehttp://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA01/Davis/photography/images/riisphotos/slideshow1.html

A New York Tenement Flat

1910http://www.usc.edu/programs/cst/deadfiles/lacasis/ansc100/library/images/397.html

Why are the photographs in How the Other Half Lives, valuable historical sources?

The Jacob A. Riis Collection

The Museum of the City of New York

Images from:

http://www.mcny.org/Exhibitions/riis/riis3.htm