Unit 5: Gilded Age & Progressive Era Flashcards

This set of vocabulary flashcards covers the causes of industrial growth, key business and social leaders, and major political reforms of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era.

Laissez-faire capitalism

The idea that government should not interfere in business or make a lot of regulations, allowing businesses to operate with little oversight.

Social Darwinism

Also known as "survival of the fittest," the belief that the rich deserved their wealth while the poor were to blame for their own condition; used to justify economic inequality.

Robber barons

A negative term for business leaders based on their unfair business practices during industrialization.

Captains of industry

A positive term for business leaders recognized for their success and contributions to industrial progress.

Andrew Carnegie

A business leader in the Steel industry who used vertical integration to streamline his company's production process.

John D. Rockefeller

A prominent leader in the Oil industry during the Gilded Age.

Cornelius Vanderbilt

A leading figure in the Railroads industry.

J.P. Morgan

A business leader associated with Private banking.

Vertical integration

A strategy where a company takes direct ownership of various stages of its production process.

Gibbons v. Ogden ($1824$) and Wabash vs. Illinois ($1886$)

Supreme Court cases that affirmed the right of Congress to regulate interstate commerce.

Interstate Commerce Act

A federal law that set guidelines for how railroads could conduct business.

Labor unions

Organizations formed by workers to unite for more power in fighting for rights and better conditions against bosses.

Populist Party

A third political party that emerged in the $1890s$ to represent the interests of farmers against railroad monopolies and banking practices.

Nativism

Prejudice against immigrants, particularly used against "new immigrants" from Southern and Eastern Europe.

Chinese Exclusion Act of $1882$

A law that outlawed all immigration from China based on race, cited as a severe example of anti-immigrant sentiment.

Muckrakers

Progressive Era social reformers who exposed problems in society, such as business corruption and poor living conditions, through writing and photography.

Upton Sinclair

The muckraker who wrote "The Jungle," which led to the Meat Inspection Act and the Pure Food and Drug Act.

Jacob Riis

A social reformer who published "How The Other Half Lives," documenting the harsh conditions of child labor and city tenements.

Jane Addams

The reformer who opened the first "settlement house," which served as a city community center.

Lincoln Steffens

A muckraker who exposed how businesses controlled the government.

Ida Tarbell

The author of "History of Standard Oil," an expose on the business practices of Rockefeller.

$17\text{th}$ Amendment

Constitutional amendment that established the direct election of senators by the people.

Clayton Antitrust Act

Legislation enacted to address issues of business corruption, monopolies, and trusts.

Ida B. Wells

A Progressive Era reformer who campaigned against lynchings.

Booker T. Washington

A civil rights leader who founded the Tuskegee Institute and believed in the importance of vocational training for African-Americans.

W.E.B. Du Bois

A civil rights advocate who founded the Niagara Movement and the NAACP, pushing for political and social change.

$19\text{th}$ Amendment ($1920$)

A Progressive Era amendment that granted women the right to vote.

Temperance Movement

A social movement that believed alcohol abuse contributed to social ills, eventually leading to the $18\text{th}$ Amendment ($1917$) which prohibited alcohol sale.