Transcript Slide 1

Political Reform and the
Progressive Era
Objectives:
Describe reforms designed to end corruption in big business.
Explain the contributions of Presidents T. Roosevelt, Taft and Wilson.
Expound upon the gains of the Women’s Movement.
Illustrate the struggles of various ethnic groups in the United States.
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Taming the Spoils System
• Spoils System – the practice of rewarding political
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supporters with government jobs
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(Ex. Ambassadorships)
This happened at both the federal and state levels.
As soon as a new executive (president or governor) was
elected, a whole new set of advisors and government
employees would be hired.
– This results in what is known as a “fat government”.
Some have connected the assassination of President
Garfield with this practice.
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Founding of the Civil Service
The Pendleton Act which stated that the Federal
government would base employment offers on
the existence of skills necessary to successfully
fulfill the duties of a position.
– This was accomplished through a series of exams
and interviews.
Passed on January 16, 1883 under President
Chester Arthur. Authored by Senator George
Pendleton, a Democrat from Ohio.
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Controlling Big Business
The Interstate Commerce Act (1887) founded the
Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC).
– This was the first Federal regulatory commission.
The original purpose was to regulate the movement of
goods around the country by railroad, but it eventually was
extended to the trucking industry as well.
The Commission was allowed to set standard rates for
any commercial good that had to travel across state lines
to be delivered.
–
–
Examples: shipping services, agricultural goods,
telephone services, oil, timber, etc.
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Controlling Big Business
The Sherman Antitrust Act was enacted on July 2, 1890.
The Act provides:
–
– “Every contract, combination in the form of trust or
otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce
among the several States, or with foreign nations, is
declared to be illegal". The Act also provides: "Every
person who shall monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or
combine or conspire with any other person or persons, to
monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the
several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed
guilty of a felony.”
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Controlling Big Business
Many judges sided with big business making the
Sherman Antitrust Act more of a “paper tiger”
than anything else.
The Act was successful in reigning in unions,
however; because the federal government could
now order workers that produced “necessary
goods and services” back to work.
– This phrase was interpreted broadly to include almost
any industry.
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What’s a Progressive?
Progressives strongly opposed waste and corruption, seeking change in
regard to worker's rights and protection of the ordinary citizen in general.
Initially the movement was successful at local level, and then it
progressed to state and gradually national.
The Progressives pushed for social justice, general equality and public
safety, but there were contradictions within the movement, especially
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regarding race.
Robert M. La Follette
Republican Senator from
Wisconsin and a progressive
reformer.
He ran for President of the
United States as the nominee
of his own Progressive Party in
1924, carrying Wisconsin and
17% of the national popular
vote.
La Follette has been called
“arguably the most important
and recognized leader of the
opposition to the growing
dominance of corporations
over the Government.”
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The Wisconsin Idea
La Follette championed numerous progressive reforms, including the first
workers' compensation system, railroad rate reform, direct legislation,
municipal home rule, open government, the minimum wage, non-partisan
elections, the open primary system, direct election of U.S. Senators,
women's suffrage, and progressive taxation.
Many of these issues were brought to forefront of national politics during
his campaign for U.S. Senator.
Muckraking journalist Lincoln Steffens began covering his campaign and
attempted to spread vicious rumors about La Follette.
– This only gave him a bigger platform upon which to discuss his ideas.
His later presidential campaign would not have been possible without
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this publicity.
The Primary System
Prior to 1903 party leaders
were the people responsible
for choosing candidates.
Wisconsin developed a
system in which people would
vote to choose electors that
would relay their choice for a
particular candidate.
– By 1917 all but 4 states followed
suit.
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Other Election Reforms
Some states gave their voters even more power by
adding more ways for them to impact legislation.
• Recall – people may vote to remove an elected official
after they have taken office
–
• Referendum – a proposed legislative act goes to the
people for final approval, rather than to a vote in the
legislature.
• Initiative – people sign a petition to propose a law and
then it is either put on the ballot or sent to the legislature
for ratification.
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Passage of the 16th Amendment
The government was trying to find a way to finance the growth of
infrastructure. Congress passed a federal income tax into law, but it was
deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. So they wrote an amendment
to change the Constitution
Ratified by Congress on February 3, 1913, this Amendment allows the
Federal Government to levy an income tax. The money collected may be
distributed however the legislature sees fit and does not need to be spent
proportionally.
The courts later interpreted the Sixteenth Amendment to allow a direct tax on
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"wages, salaries, commissions, etc. without apportionment."
Passage of the 17th Amendment
It was ratified on April 8, 1913 and was first put into effect for the election of
1914.
It amends Article I, Section 3 of the Constitution to provide for the direct
election of Senators by the people of a state rather than their election or
appointment by a state legislature.
It also allows the governor of each state, if authorized by that state's
legislature, to appoint a senator in the event of an opening, until an election
occurs.
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Muckrakers
The term muckraker most associated with a group of American
investigative reporters, novelists and critics from the late 1800s to
early 1900s, who investigated and exposed societal issues such as
conditions in slums and prisons, sweatshops, mines and unsanitary
conditions in food processing plants.
Muckrakers were often accused of being socialists or communists.
In the early 1900s, muckrakers shed light on such issues by writing
books and articles for popular magazines and newspapers such as
Cosmopolitan, The Independent, and McClure's.
President Theodore Roosevelt is credited with originating the term
'muckraker.' During a speech in 1906 he likened the muckrakers to
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the Man with the Muckrake, a character in John Bunyan's Pilgrim's
Theodore Roosevelt
Was born in 1831 to a wealthy merchant family. He was
the second of five children.
– His younger brother Elliot is the father of Eleanor Roosevelt.
His father had supported Abraham Lincoln; his mother
was a former southern belle with two brothers who were
officers in the Confederate Army.
As a child he was severely asthmatic, but was also said
to be hyperactive and mischievous.
– Because of his illness he was home schooled. He did very well
but was horrible at math.
In 1876 he graduated from Harvard and then went on to
Columbia Law School.
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Theodore Roosevelt
When offered a chance to run for New
York Assemblyman in 1881, he dropped
out of law school to pursue his new goal
of entering public life.
He became good friends with fellow
Progressive Henry Cabot Lodge (they
will later become bitter enemies).
Later he would become head of the Civil
Service Commission under both
Benjamin Harrison and Grover
Cleveland.
He was named Assistant Secretary of
the Navy by William McKinley in 1897.
– Later he would accept the post of Vice
President after his success in the
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Spanish-American War.
The Assassination of McKinley
While greeting a crowd of supporters during the
Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York
President William McKinley was shot on
September 6, 1901.
– Leon Frank Czolgosz waited in line with a
pistol in his right hand concealed by a
handkerchief. At 4:07 P.M. Czolgosz fired
twice at the president.
– The first bullet grazed the president's
shoulder. The second, however, went through
McKinley's stomach, colon, and kidney, and
finally lodged in the muscles of his back.
At 2:15 A.M. on September 14, 1901, eight days
after he was shot, he died from gangrene
surrounding his wounds. His last words were "It is
God's way; His will be done, not ours.“ and he was
buried in Canton, Ohio.
– This left Roosevelt at 42 as the youngest
President in American history up until this
point.
Czolgosz was later found guilty of murder, and
was executed by electric chair at Auburn Prison on
October 29, 1901.
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TR and Big Business
His 20,000-word address to the Congress in December 1901, asked Congress to
curb the power of trusts "within reasonable limits." They did not act but Roosevelt
did, issuing 44 lawsuits against major corporations; he was called the “trust-buster”
The first suit he brought (on behalf of the federal government) was against the
Northern Securities Company in 1902.
– This large railroad trust had been formed earlier that year by E. H. Harriman,
James J. Hill, J.P. Morgan, J. D. Rockefeller, and their associates.
– The company controlled the Northern Pacific Railway, Great Northern Railway,
Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, and other associated lines through a
merger.
After vigorous federal prosecution, the company was dissolved according to the 1904
Supreme Court ruling in the Northern Securities case, five to four.
The companies were convicted under the Sherman Antitrust Act, overturning the
previous decision of United States v. E. C. Knight Co.
– In that case, the Court ruled that the Sherman Antitrust Act was insufficient
in
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regulating that monopoly.
TR & Organized Labor
In 1902 the United Mine Workers of America went on strike in Pennsylvania.
– Resulting in a shut down of anthracite mines for 163 days.
To avoid a national emergency Roosevelt called the mine owners and the labor
leaders to the White House and negotiated a compromise.
– The miners were granted a 10% pay increase and a 9-hour day (from the
previous 10 hours), but the union was not officially recognized and the price of
coal went up to offset the cost of the pay increase.
In later comments, Roosevelt acknowledged the “noble intent” of labor unions and
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suggested the courts were biased against them.
TR and Consumers
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Upton Sinclair’s novel The Jungle shocked and sickened readers with its
description of a meat packaging plant
[T]he meat would be shoveled into carts, and the man who did the shoveling would not trouble to lift
out a rat even when he saw one—there were things that went into the sausage in comparison with
which a poisoned rat was a tidbit. There was no place for the men to wash their hands before they
ate their dinner, and so they made a practice of washing them in the water that was to be ladled into
the sausage. There were the butt-ends of smoked meat, and the scraps of corned beef, and all the
odds and ends of the waste of the plants, that would be dumped into old barrels in the cellar and left
there. Under the system of rigid economy which the packers enforced, there were some jobs that it
only paid to do once in a long time, and among these was the cleaning out of the waste barrels.
Every spring they did it; and in the barrels would be dirt and rust and old nails and stale water—and
cartload after cartload of it would be taken up and dumped into the hoppers with fresh meat, and
sent out to the public’s breakfast.
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Led to the passage of the Meat Inspection Act in 1906
Upton
Sinclair
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TR and Consumers (2)
• Chief of the Bureau of Chemistry, Dr. Harvey Wiley
discovered the unhealthy ingredients people were taking
as “medicine”
• Congress passes Pure Food and Drug Act
– Law requires manufacturers to list all ingredients on a
label
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TR and Conservation
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TR made conservation a matter of public policy
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TR wanted to protect environment from lumber and mining
companies
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TR was a great outdoorsman – loved to fish and hunt and
appreciated beauty of the land
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With TR’s help, Congress creates U.S. Forest Service and sets
aside land to be used as a national park
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First national park – Yellowstone National Park
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William Howard Taft
• TR decided not to run for president in 1908.
• TR chose Taft to be his successor – Taft was Secretary
of War
• Taft was governor of Philippines – did a very good job
• Problem – Taft was not as energetic or as liberal as TR
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Taft – The Good and the Bad
• Good
–
–
–
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Broke up more trusts than TR
Created agency to control child labor
Gave government workers 8-hour work day
Bad
- Tariff increase (Payne-Aldrich Tariff)
- Gave conserved lands to business for development
Uncle Joe
Cannon
Sereno
Payne
Nelson
Aldrich
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Gifford Pinchot
He was a progressive who strongly believed in the efficiency movement.
–
The most economically efficient use of natural resources was his goal.
–
Pinchot developed a plan by which the forests could be developed by private interests, under set
terms, in exchange for a fee.
–
Pinchot made the standards at the Forestry Service very high and quickly set off to
professionalize the forestry industry.
He was fired from the Forestry Service by Howard Taft for speaking out against
policies
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of the Department of the Interior that were environmentally unsound
Governor Pinchot
Governor William Sproul appointed him Pennsylvania
State Commissioner of Forestry in 1920.
Pinchot's aim, however, was to become governor. His
1922 campaign for the office concentrated on popular
reforms: government economy, enforcement of
Prohibition and regulation of public utilities. He won and
became Pennsylvania’s 29th governor.
Pinchot retired at the end of his term in 1927. But won a
second term in 1930, battling for regulation of public
utilities, relief for the unemployed, and construction of
paved roads to "get the farmers out of the mud."
– This was the achievement he was most proud of.
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Election of 1912
Roosevelt endorsed William Howard Taft as the Republican
candidate in 1908 because he claimed to be a genuine
"progressive“.
In that election Taft easily defeated three-time candidate William
Jennings Bryan.
•
Many claim that the Progressive movement “lost steam” under Taft
because he was not as charismatic a leader as Roosevelt. This lead
many to leave the party to support the newly liberal Democrats.
In 1910, Roosevelt and Taft broke off their friendship. Roosevelt lost
the Republican nomination to Taft and ran in the 1912 election on
his own one-time Bull Moose ticket.
– He beat Taft in the popular vote.
– This split caused Democrat Woodrow Wilson to pull ahead because
neither could gain enough electoral votes to win.
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Wilson and New Freedom
Wilson continued the work begun by
Roosevelt in trust-busting.
He spoke to Congress urging them to
revive the free enterprise system and to
“wake up the economy”.
In 1914, the Federal Trade
Commission (FTC) was founded.
– This agency investigates reports of
fraud by businesses.
Later, Wilson signed the Clayton
Antitrust Act which reiterated the
legislative intent of the Sherman Act
while limiting the use of that act to
regulation of unions.
Library of Congress
(111-SC-4984)
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The Women’s Movement
In July 1848 more than 300 men and women assembled
in Seneca Falls, New York, for the nation's first
women's rights convention.
– On the first day, Elizabeth Cady Stanton presented the
organizers' Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions
(patterned after the Declaration of Independence).
– The Seneca Falls declaration held that "all men and women" are
created equal and are endowed with inalienable rights including
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
– The 12 resolutions of the Declaration of Sentiments called for
the repeal of laws that enforced unequal treatment of women,
the recognition of women as the equals of men, the granting of
the right to vote, the right for women to speak in churches, and
the equal participation of women with men in "the various trades,
professions, and commerce."
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Suffrage
Connections made at the convention eventually lead to
the creation of the National Women’s Suffrage
Association.
Suffrage was granted in the “new” western states in the
late 1800s mainly because of the low population and the
need for registered voters for the rights of incorporation.
As the need for more income grew so too did the
number of women in the workforce, nearly 5 million by
1900.
– This only added fuel to the suffrage fire because now women
were subjected to direct taxation and were still not allowed to
vote.
– They therefore had TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION!
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Leaders of the Suffrage
Movement
• Susan B. Anthony – arrested for illegal voting
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton – one of the first women to
become a lawyer
• They were the first generation leaders of the National
Women’s Suffrage Association (NWSA)
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Next Generation of Woman’s
Suffrage Leaders
• Carrie Chapman Catt – strategy to win state by state
approval; met with leaders in Washington many times
• Alice Paul – grass roots support through protest and civil
disobedience
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New Opportunities for Women
Prior to the emergence of a solidified women’s movement, the entrance of
women into certain professions was limited.
– While women could study to become professionals, many states
refused to license them.
Around the same time, women’s organizations which had once been only
social in nature (The Daughter’s of the American Revolution, The Women’s
Auxiliary, etc.) began to take on political stances.
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Women’s Clubs
• Women joined clubs to read books and share ideas
• Clubs raised money for libraries, schools and parks
• African American women formed own clubs to battle
against segregation
• Florence Kelley – investigates sweatshop conditions and
organized boycotts of goods produced by factories that
employed children
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Prohibition
In 1874 a group of women, lead by Frances Willard, formed the
Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU).
–
They held meetings with officials which “revealed the evils of
alcohol”. According to this group alcohol was a direct CAUSE
of each of the following societal ills:
1. Domestic Violence
2. Child Abuse
3. Unemployment
4. Murder
5. Theft
6. Vagrancy
After hearing this convincing argument, and being pressured by
their constituents, Congress passed the 18th Amendment.
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The 18th Amendment
The "Volstead Act," was passed by Congress over
President Wilson's veto on October 28, 1918 and
established the legal definition of intoxicating liquor and
established the prohibition of alcohol in the United States.
– Section 1. … the manufacture, sale, or transportation
of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof
into, or the exportation thereof from the United States
… for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.
–
It is the only amendment to the United States Constitution
to ever be repealed (by the Twenty-first Amendment).
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Carrie Nation
•
Carrie Nation led a radical response to sale of alcohol
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First marriage ended because her husband became alcoholic
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She was generous to needy and poor; visited prisoners in jail
•
Came to public attention when she used bricks and hatchets to
close down bars in Kansas
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Her actions led to several beatings and jail time
•
She collapsed during a lecture on the evils of alcohol and died
several months later
•
She was also a supporter of women’s suffrage
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Unexpected Consequence
•
The passage of the 18th Amendment did little to stop the flow of alcohol
•
Made alcohol more attractive (fun doing bad things!)
•
Speakeasies – Hidden bars in cities operating against the law
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Bootleggers - those who smuggled alcohol across state lines
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Organized Crime – large scale criminal operations
•
Al Capone – famous gangster who made millions off of illegal booze; jailed
for tax evasion
•
FBI in charge of enforcing prohibition
FBI
agent
Elliot
Ness
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Challenges Facing African Americans
Jim Crow laws allowed for an increased period
of discrimination against African Americans to
exist following the Civil War Amendments.
Discrimination in housing, lending, education
and employment were particularly unfair in both
the North and South.
– Redlining, or the informal segregation of where
certain groups are allowed to live, started in this
period and some say that it still exists today.
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Booker T. Washington
• Became most prominent African American of his time
• Taught himself to read
• Founded Tuskegee Institute in Alabama
• Wanted blacks to learn a trade and move up gradually
(economic power
social equality)
• View popular among white leaders
Tuskegee Institute today
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W.E.B. Du Bois
• First African American to receive PhD from Harvard
University
• Criticized Washington’s approach to equality
• Believed blacks had to fight for their rights in the courts
• In 1909, helped found the NAACP – an organization to
help blacks obtain equal rights in the courts
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Other Famous African Americans
George Washington Carver made great strides in the
field of genetics. His successful cross breeding of
peanut plants in the South saved the industry from ruin.
Sarah Walker created a line of hair care products for
African American women and became the first American
woman to earn more than $1 million.
Ida B. Wells was a civil rights advocate and an early
women's rights advocate active in the Woman Suffrage
Movement. She lead the crusade to have the practice of
lynching outlawed. ,
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Challenges Facing Mexican Americans
In the Southwest Mexican migrant farmers had been
crossing the border for work for decades.
It was not until around 1900 that things got so bad in
Mexico that they were compelled to stay.
They were often paid very little and, like African
Americans, were denied housing and education.
Many Mexican Americans settled in Texas and southern
California.
– The population of Los Angeles tripled between 1910 and 1920
as a result.
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Response by Mexican
Americans
• Sought to preserve language and culture
– Barrios – ethnic neighborhoods
• Mutualistas – mutual aid societies
– Paid for insurance
– Paid for legal advice
– Raised money for sick and needy
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Challenges Facing Asian Americans
Following the passage of the Chinese
Exclusion Act of 1882 many West Coast
companies started to recruit workers from other
Asian countries like Japan and the Philippines.
They too were forced to endure discrimination in
housing, lending and education.
Many in the western states did not dissociate
these new immigrants from the Chinese who
had “taken” their jobs on the railroad and they
engaged in anti-Asian protests.
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Gentlemen’s Agreement
•
In 1906, San Francisco forced Asian children to attend separate schools from whites
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Japan protested the move and created an international crisis
•
Unions pressured TR to limit Japanese immigration
•
“Gentlemen’s Agreement” reached in 1907
– Japan would stop sending workers to U.S.
– U.S. stop the segregated schools
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Religious Minorities
As the number of immigrants from southern and eastern
Europe increased, so too did the number of Roman
Catholics in the United States.
– Groups like the Anti-Catholic American Protective
Association lobbied Congress for quotas on Catholic
immigrants.
People of the Jewish faith faced stereotypes of being
greedy and untrustworthy.
Many formed small communities within larger cities so
they could provide for themselves and not have to be
degraded by other prejudiced business owners.
– Examples: Little Italy, Greenwich Village, etc.
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