APUSH 28: American Pageant 17th Edition Chapter 28: Progressives and the Republican Roosevelt

Key terms, people, places, and events from APUSH textbook

How The Other Half Lives

1890 book by Jacob A. Riis detailing the squalid conditions endured by New York City’s lower class

Corrupt Practices Acts

State laws that limited the amounts candidates could spend on campaigns, and limited size of corporate gifts that could be accepted by candidates

Millionare’s Club

Pejorative term for the Senate, referencing the corporate influence of Congress and the disproportionate wealth of senators

Australian Ballot

private ballots for elections intended to curb vote buying

Initiative

voters can suggest legislation directly, bypassing state legislatures

Referendum

laws are placed on election ballots for direct approval by voters

Recall

voters can elect to remove corrupt or inefficient officials

17th Amendment

1913 Constitutional amendment that established direct election of Senators by the people

Social Gospel

A reform movement led by Protestant ministers who used religious doctrine to demand better housing and living conditions for the urban poor. Popular at the turn of the twentieth century, it was closely linked to the settlement-house movement, which brought middle-class, Anglo-American service volunteers into contact with immigrants and working people.

Galveston, Texas

Texas city that appointed a commission of city managers to manage urban affairs in 1901, model for later commission

Muller v. Oregon

1908 landmark Supreme Court case that upheld the constitutionality of laws restricting the number of hours women could work

Lochner v. New York

1905 Supreme Court case invalidating a New York law limiting the work day of bakers to 10 hours

Triangle Shirtwaist Fire

1911 factory fire in New York City that killed 146 mostly immigrant women due to egregious violations of the fire code, highlighted the need for stricter labor safety laws

Worker’s Compensation

Insurance for workers injured in on-the-job accidents

Women’s Christian Temperance Union

anti-liquor organization founded by Frances E. Willard, who prayed on saloon floors. Became the largest organization of women in the world, with over 1 million members

Dry Laws

local, county, and state laws the restricted alcohol and saloons, largely in rural areas. ½ of population lived in dry areas by WW1, ¾ of people lived in places that banned saloons

Wet territory

areas where alcohol was legal, largely immigrant-filled big cities, whose residents were accustomed to the unrestricted drinking in Europe

18th Amendment

1919 Constitutional Amendment that outlawed the production, distribution, and sale of alcohol

Three C’s

Roosevelt’s social program of Control of the Corporations, Consumer protection, and Conservation of natural resources, outlined the “Square Deal” for capital, labor, and the public

Anthracite Coal Strike

1902 coal strike in Pennsylvania, in which 140,000 mostly immigrant miners demanded a 20% pay raise and a 9 hour work day, disrupted production and caused hospitals to not be able to get heat

George F. Baer

Spokesman for mine owners who said that workers would be cared for by owners who were bestowed with the property by God, swayed public opinion in favor of workers

White House meeting

Roosevelt called for a meeting between labor representatives and mine owners, owners agreed to arbitration under threat of government seizure of mines. Strike ends with a 10% pay raise and a 9 hour work day, union was never recognized as a bargaining agent

Lassiez-Faire

low-regulation capitalism that defined the Gilded Age

Wealth Against Commonwealth

Henry D. Lloyd’s 1894 book attacking the Standard Oil Company

The Theory of the Leisure Class

Thorstein Veblen’s 1899 book which attacked the newly rich with their “predatory wealth”, “conspicuous consumption”, and useless “business”, urges social leaders to sway away from these men

Muckrakers

term used by Theodore Roosevelt in 1906 to describe young investigative journalists who wrote human interest stories and exposés about corruption and subpar living conditions in tenements, but often were sensationalistic

The Treason of the Senate

1906 Cosmopolitan article by David G. Phillips which argued that 75/90 senators represented special interest groups, corporations, and trusts rather than individual constituents, Phillips was killed in 1911 by a man he had allegedly maligned

Hepburn Act of 1906

Free passes are restricted, Interstate Commerce Commission is expanded to extend to railcar companies, and allows ICC to nullify shipping rates

Northern Securities Company

JP Morgan and James J. Hill’s railroad holdings company that sough a railroad monopoly in the Northwest, attacked by Roosevelt in 1902, NSC loses Supreme Court appeal in 1904, forcefully dissolved

Swift & Co. vs. United States

1905 Supreme Court case that outlawed the beef trust, allows federal government to attack monopolies that disrupt commerce, allows Congress to regulate meat industry

Meat Inspection Act

1906 law that allowed the USDA to inspect meat that was shipped over state lines

Elkins Act of 1903

1903 law that gave heavy fines to railroads that offered rebates and to shippers that accepted them

The Jungle

Upton Sinclair’s sensationalistic 1906 novel that highlighted the shady and disgusting practices of the meatpacking industry, shocked the nation, including Roosevelt, who ordered a sanitation investigation in Chicago

Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906

1906 law outlawing the mislabeling or adulterating of food that was sold across state lines

Desert Land Act of 1877

1877 law which allowed the government to sell dry desert land for cheap under the condition that the buyer would irrigate the land within 3 years

Forest Reserve Act of 1891

1891 law authorizing the president to designate public forests as national parks and nature reserves, protecting them from logging and development, saved 46 million acres in the 1890s

Carey Act of 1894

1894 law that distributed federal land to the states under the condition that it was to be irrigated and settled

Gifford Pinchot

Head of the Federal Division of Forestry, notable early conservationist, believed that “wilderness was waste”

Newlands Act of 1902

1902 law that authorized the federal government to collect money from the sale of desert lands in western states and to use the money to fund irrigation projects

Roosevelt Dam

Dam constructed on Arizona’s Salt River thanks to the Newlands Act, dedicated to Roosevelt in 1911

The Call of the Wild

Jack London’s 1903 novel about a sled dog in the Klondike Gold Rush who escapes his kidnappers and lives in the wild, popular among city dwellers that were worried about the societal and environmental effects of urbanization

Hetch Hetchy Controversy

Controversial 1913 federal decision to allow San Francisco to construct a dam in Yosemite National Park to store its municipal water supply

Teddy Bear

Nickname for Theodore Roosevelt, referencing an instance in which he refused to shoot a bear that was tied up to a tree on an hunting trip, also references his conservationism

Panic of 1907

Financial crisis in October 1907 caused by a failed attempt at a large stock buyout of the United Copper Company and subsequent bank runs of institutions that lent money to investors

Aldrich-Vreeland Act of 1908

1908 law that authorized national banks to issue emergency currency backed with collateral

1908 Election

Roosevelt’s hand picked successor and former secretary of war, William Howard Taft (GOP) defeats anti-imperialist, anti-gold standard William Jennings Bryan (Democrat) and Pullman Strike hero Eugene V. Debs (Socialist), 321-162

Brownsville Affair

1906 dishonorable discharging of 150 black soldiers ordered by Roosevelt for false accusations of inciting violence in Brownsville, Texas. Not pardoned by Congress until 1972

Malefactors of Great Wealth

Term used by Roosevelt to describe trust owners who he believed engineered the Panic of 1907 to force the government to abandon antitrust cases

Dollar Diplomacy

The use of American investments and holdings to promote American interests abroad

Philander C. Knox

William Howard Taft’s Secretary of State

Manchuria Blunder

Taft and Knox’s much ridiculed 1909 failed attempt to buy out Manchurian railroads from Japan and Russia and later turn them over to China, represents an issue in the Open Door policy

Nicaraguan Revolution

Armed uprising in Nicaragua in 1912 partly caused by American interests, 2500 Marines were deployed and remained there until 1925

Standard Oil Company

Massive oil conglomerate owned by John D. Rockefeller that was ordered by the Supreme Court to be dissolved in 1911, hands down “rule of reason”

Rule of Reason

Supreme Court doctrine that declared only trusts that unreasonably restrained trade to be illegal, greatly harbors government’s ability to prosecute antitrust cases

US Steel Corporation

Large American steel company that was the subject of a Taft antitrust lawsuit, angering Roosevelt, who helped organize the targeted merger

Payne-Aldrich Bill

1909 law which increased tariffs on certain items, angering Republicans who wanted to lower the duties

Ballinger-Pinchot Quarrel

1910 quarrel resulting from Richard Ballinger, Secretary of the Interior, opening federal lands in Alaska and Wyoming to corporate development, rebuked heavily by Forestry chief Gifford Pinchot, results in taft dismissing Pinchot for insubordination

New Nationalism

Roosevelt’s 1910 Doctrine that advocated for a stronger federal government to remedy economic and social abuses

1910 Midterms

A divided Republican Party loses congressional seats in a landslide, Democrats hold 228-161 seat House majority, Republicans hold 51-41 Senate Majority

Dr. Woodrow Wilson

Democratic presidential nominee in 1912, progressive Princeton professor and later university president

New Freedom

Democratic platform in 1912 that was heavily progressive and wanted governmental power to be returned to the people

Bull-Moose Party

Roosevelt’s progressive party that ran in 1912, more of a splinter group of the Republican Party

The Promise of American Life

Herbert Croly’s 1910 book that argued for the consolidation of trusts and labor unions, along with an increase in the power of federal regulatory agencies, strongly influenced the Bull-Moose Platform

1912 Bull-Moose Platform

Consolidations of trusts and labor unions, female suffrage, minimum wage laws, publicly supported healthcare, stronger regulatory agencies

1912 Election

Democrat Woodrow Wilson receives 435 electoral votes compared to Roosevelt’s 88 and Taft’s 8, Taft later becomes Chief Justice of the Supreme Court

John Muir

(1838-1914) This noted naturalist split with conservationists like Gifford Pinchot by trying to protect natural "temples" like the Hetch Hetchy Valley from development. In 1892 he founded the Sierra Club, which is now one of the most influential conservation organizations in the United States. His writings and philosophy shaped the formation of the modern environmental movement.

Ida Tarbell

Muckraker who published a scathing history of Standard Oil Company, helped purchase American magazine in 1906

The Bitter Cry of the Children

John Spargo’s 1906 book that outlined the horrors of child labor

Dr. Harvey W Wiley

Chief chemist for the Department of Agriculture who performed various experiments on himself using dangerous consume products with his “Poison Squad”

The Financier & The Titan

Theodore Dreiser’s 1912 and 1914 novels, respectively, that bashed promoters and profiteers

Jane Addams

Reformer who spearheaded the Settlement House movement, helped immigrants assimilate while maintaining cultural practices

Following the Color Line

Ray Stannard Baker’s 1908 novel highlighting the subjugation of American blacks

Florence Kelley

Former president of Jane Addams’ Hull House, first chief factory inspector of Illinois, head of the National Consumers League

Fighting Bob La Folette

(1855-1925) Hailing from Wisconsin, La Follette was one of the most militant of the progressive Republican leaders. He served in the Senate and in the Wisconsin governor’s seat and was a perennial contender for the presidency, keeping the spirit of progressivism alive into the 1920s.

Frances E. Willard

(1839-1898) This pious leader of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union wished to eliminate the sale of alcohol and thereby "make the world more homelike." Her ecumenical "do everything" reform sensibility encouraged some women to take the leap toward more radical causes like woman suffrage while allowing more conservative women to stick comfortably with temperance work.