7.4 The Progressive Era and Early 20th Century Reform and National Policy

Overview of the Progressive Movement

• The Progressive movement consisted of a diverse group of reformers in the early $20^{th}$ century who aimed to address social, political, and economic abuses resulting from late $19^{th}$ century industrialization.
• Progressives advocated for significant government intervention as the primary solution to social and economic ills, contrasting with the Gilded Age elite attitude that government intervention was the root of such problems.
• While the Gilded Age focus was on obtaining freedom from the government, the Progressive Era was characterized by seeking freedom through government action, placing the economy, society, and politics under government oversight.
• Progressives are considered the heirs to the Populist movement of the $1890s$. While many Populist reforms were initially unsuccessful due to their predominantly rural and agrarian base, the Progressives successfully implemented many of these ideas.
• Distinct differences existed between the two movements:
  • Populists focused on rural Americans and represented the lower working class.
  • Progressives focused on urban reform within industrialized cities and typically belonged to the middle and upper classes.
• The movement was composed of various diverse groups including Protestant church leaders, feminists, labor union leaders, African-Americans, and others who, while agreeing on methods for change, often disagreed on specific reform priorities.

Progressive Approaches to Racial Injustice

• Attitudes toward racial segregation among Progressives were split into three camps: those who supported it in the South, those who ignored its presence, and those who worked to dismantle it (primarily black Progressives).
• Booker T. Washington was a black reformer who discouraged active fighting against segregation through social or political movements. He advocated for self-improvement through education and the development of virtues such as thrift and abstinence.
• Washington founded the all-black Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, which emphasized virtuous habits and practical industrial skills. He believed that if black Americans became economically vital to industry, segregation would gradually disappear as marginalization became too costly for white Americans.
• Ida B. Wells, a journalist, rejected practicalism and encouraged active resistance against segregation. She spoke out vigorously against the lynching of black Americans in the South. After her printing equipment was destroyed by white supremacists, she relocated to Chicago to continue her work against white supremacy.
• web deo occupied a middle ground, agreeing on the importance of self-improvement but insisting that true equality required equal voting rights and the elimination of segregated public facilities.
• do the boys founded the all-black Niagara movement to fight for voting rights and equal access to public facilities. Although the organization struggled, it eventually joined with white reformers like Florence Kelly and Jane Adams to form the National Association for the Advancement of Color People (NAACP).
• The NAACP achieved success by challenging segregation and lynching in the courts, creating judicial precedents that would later support the mid-$20^{th}$ century civil rights movement.

Expanding Popular Participation in Politics

• Progressives sought to transfer political power away from elites and toward average Americans through four major mechanisms:
  • The Secret Ballot (Australian Ballot): Used to combat corruption, this system replaced party-printed ballots that were marked in public. Massachusetts adopted it first in $1888$, and all states followed within $2$ decades.
  • The Direct Primary: Introduced by the governor of Wisconsin, this allowed ordinary citizens, rather than corrupt political machines, to choose their party's candidates.
  • Direct Election of Senators: Progressivism successfully targeted the practice of large corporations bribing state legislatures to influence Senate elections. The $17^{th}$ amendment to the Constitution, ratified in $1913$, officially placed the election of senators in the hands of the people.
  • Initiative, Referendum, and Recall: These expanded voter participation. The "initiative" allowed voters to force legislators to vote on a bill; the "referendum" allowed citizens to vote directly on proposed bills; and the "recall" gave voters the power to remove elected officials before the end of their term.

Government Efficiency and Scientific Management

• Progressives aimed to increase government efficiency by applying the principles of Taylorism, or scientific management, developed by Frederick Taylor.
• Scientific management originally aimed to make factory work more productive and profitable; Progressives believed these principles could remedy the corruption and inefficiency of governments and political machines.
• Cities began adopting the commission form of government, where elected commissioners managed specific departments as if they were business units.
• The urban position of "city manager" was created to act as a CEO for the city, ensuring local programs ran with peak efficiency.
• Under these reforms, local governments treated the public less like constituents and more like shareholders, running government operations like businesses.

Perspectives on Immigration and Social Reform

• The continued arrival of large numbers of immigrants from Europe and Asia led to diverse Progressive reactions.
• Margaret Sanger advocated for birth control among poor urban immigrants. Her work was influenced by eugenics theories, as she believed reducing the number of children born to non-white women would improve the quality and quantity of the white race.
• Jane Adams established settlement houses in urban areas to provide immigrants with healthcare, education, and childcare. These efforts were also rooted in the eugenics movement.
• Labor union leaders advocated for immigration restrictions. They argued that foreign workers drove down wages and competed with American citizens for jobs.
• Legal victories for restrictivists included the Immigration Act of $1917$ and another act in $1921$, which combined to cut off almost all Asian immigration and significantly limit European immigration.

Environmental Policy: Conservation vs. Preservation

• The closing of the frontier in $1890$ increased the urgency of managing natural resources using principles of efficiency, leading to a debate between conservationists and preservationists.
• Conservationists, such as Gford Pinshow, believed natural resources (forests, coal, oil) should be extracted and used while balancing that use with efforts to maintain the landscape's beauty.
• Preservationists, such as John Mure, aimed to protect the natural beauty of the landscape by preventing all resource extraction entirely.
• President Theodore Roosevelt was a major advocate for the environment, issuing executive orders to protect wildlife and the landscape, and overseeing the creation of $3$ protected national parks.

Muckraking Journalism and Legislative Reform

• Muckrakers were investigative journalists who exposed corruption in business and government through scathing articles and essays.
• Ida Tarbell exposed the illegal activities of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil company, detailing how it eliminated market competition.
• Ingp Punchu, a Chinese American muckraker, wrote about the gross injustices and suffering caused by the Chinese Exclusion Act.
• Upton Sinclair's book, The Jungle, detailed the horrifyingly unsanitary conditions within industrial meatpacking plants.
• The public outcry from muckraking led to the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act, which established government oversight to ensure food safety and prevent contamination. These acts reinforced the Progressive belief that the government must protect the welfare of its citizens.

National Progressivism under Roosevelt and Wilson

• Theodore Roosevelt introduced the "Square Deal," aiming to balance the interests of big business and the working class.
• In the $1902$ Pennsylvania coal strike, Roosevelt threatened to use federal troops to operate the mines when owners refused to budge. The owners eventually conceded better wages and shorter hours, though they did not recognize the union.
• Roosevelt, known as the "trustbuster," broke up more than $40$ trusts by rigorously enforcing the Sherman Antitrust Act of $1890$, specifically targeting "bad trusts" that eliminated competition and used predatory pricing.
• Woodro Wilson attacked the "triple wall of privilege": tariffs, banking, and trusts.
• Wilson led the passage of the Underwood Tariff Act in $1913$, reducing tariffs on manufactured goods to help rural Americans.
• Wilson championed banking reform by arguing that the gold standard caused economic hardship. He created the Federal Reserve, a national banking system designed to regulate the money supply and set interest rates to promote economic flourishing.

Constitutional Amendments of the Progressive Era

• The $16^{th}$ Amendment established a national income tax, fulfilling a failed Populist goal from the $1890s$.
• The $17^{th}$ Amendment provided for the direct election of senators by the people.
• The $18^{th}$ Amendment, ratified in $1919$, established Prohibition, banning the consumption of alcohol. This was rooted in the work of middle-class women reformers who saw alcohol as a source of moral decay and political corruption.
• Prohibitionists utilized the United States' entry into World War I in $1917$ to argue that grain used for alcohol was needed for the war effort. The amendment remained in effect until its repeal in $1933$.
• The $19^{th}$ Amendment was ratified in $1920$, recognizing the right of women to vote. This followed decades of activism beginning with the Seneca Falls Convention in $1848$. The movement gained momentum as other democratic countries internationally began recognizing women's suffrage.