Transcript Slide 1

The Progressive Era
1880-1920
APUSH Chapter 28
Essential Questions
Why was a “reform” movement
necessary during the late 19th
century?
 How did industrialization,
immigration, & urbanization
contribute to this movement?
 Who were the progressive
reformers? (social class)
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Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire
1911 Spirit p. 213
Progressive Era Amendments
 17th
Amendment:
Direct election of Senators
 18th Amendment:
Prohibition of Alcohol
 19th Amendment:
Women’s suffrage
Significance of initiative, referendum, & recall?
Progressive Roots
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Well before 1900, politicians and
writers had begun to pinpoint
targets for the progressive attack
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Henry Demarest Lloyd assailed the
Standard Oil Company in 1894
 Wealth
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Against Commonwealth
Jacob A. Riis shocked middle-class
Americans in 1890 with
 How
the Other Half Lives which
described the dark and dirty slums of
New York
Muckrakers
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Journalists who wrote about the corrupt
side of business during early 20th century
Expose unethical/unfair business practices
Expose abuse of power by big business
Fought to end child labor
Expose unsanitary & unsafe conditions
Raking the Muck
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Popular magazines, (McClure’s,
Collier’s) , began to appear in
American newsstands in 1902
They exposed the corruption and
scandal that the public loved to
hate
 These were very popular with the
average citizen, but much less so
with the wealthy
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Jacob Riis
Riis’s book showed the plight of the
urban poor, mostly immigrants who
were forced to live in small cramped
spaces that lacked adequate
sanitation or ventilation
Upton Sinclair
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Famous Muckraker
Wrote The Jungle
Exposes unsanitary
conditions of the
meat packing
industry
Greatly influenced
others to
investigate
businesses
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At the turn of the Twentieth century, the United States was entering
the era of progressivism. Following the tumultuous Gilded Age where
each level of government favored big business, many lower-class
Americans demanded change at the workplace. This included higher
wages, the rights for workers to unionize without penalty, safer
working conditions, amongst others.
On September 20, 1878, Upton Sinclair was born in Baltimore,
Maryland into a poor, lower class family. His family resided in
Baltimore, until their move to New York City when he was ten. After
finishing Columbia University, Sinclair traveled along the Northeast.
He married Meta Fuller and settled down in Princeton, N.J. After
publishing many unsuccessful novels, he got caught in the growing
socialist movement in America under Eugene V. Debs. Sinclair began
to write books advocating change through investigative journalism;
this practice was called muckraking. Upon hearing about a job in
Chicago to investigate the meat-packing industry, he moved there to
examine the workers’ conditions. He published his findings in The
Jungle, a novel depicting an immigrant who worked in one of plants.
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Although many people thought the aim of The Jungle was to target
the unsanitary conditions of the meat-packing industry, Sinclair was
more focused on revolutionizing America into a socialistic society. He
advocated for the end of “wage slavery” and a redistribution of
wealth.
How would Socialism change that?" asked the girl-student, quickly. It
was the first time she had spoken.
"So long as we have wage slavery," answered Schliemann, "it
matters not in the least how debasing and repulsive a task may be, it
is easy to find people to perform it. But just as soon as labor is set
free, then the price of such work will begin to rise. So one by one
the old, dingy, and unsanitary factories will come down—it will be
cheaper to build new; and so the steamships will be provided with
stoking machinery, and so the dangerous trades will be made safe,
or substitutes will be found for their products. In exactly the same
way, as the citizens of our Industrial Republic become refined, year
by year the cost of slaughterhouse products will increase; until
eventually those who want to eat meat will have to do their own
killing—and how long do you think the custom would survive then?
Excerpt from The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
Ida Tarbell
Who was her
main target?
 Why?
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John Rockefeller
Lincoln Steffens
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Famous book?
The Shame of the Cities
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“I have been over
into the future, and
it works."
Progressive Governors
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Robert M. LaFollette  
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Governor of Wisconsin
Took power back from big business
(1901)
Emerged as a leading figure in the
Progressive movement
Hiram W. Johnson
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Governor of California
Broke the power of the Southern Pacific
Railroad in state politics (1910)
Carrie Chapman Catt
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Reform movement?
Why did she
challenge the 14th &
15th Amendments?
Was she successful?
Women’s suffrage
amendment?
Spirit p. 224
Florence Kelley
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Associated with
which reforms?
Child labor
Minimum Wage
8 hour workdays
Progressive Women
 Female
activists worked through
various organizations
 Women's
Trade Union League
 National Consumers League
 Led
by Florence Kelly (1899)
 Mobilized female consumers to
pressure government for laws
safeguarding women and children
in the workplace
Theodore Roosevelt
Increased the power and prestige of the presidency
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26th president of U.S.
(1901 – 1909)
Gained fame in Spanish
American War
First modern president:
transformed presidency
into the strong executive
office it is today
Roosevelt saw the
presidency as a “bully
pulpit” from which he
could influence news and
shape legislation
Square Deal
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Various progressive reforms
sponsored by Roosevelt to help
common citizens
Fight big business (trust-busting)
Regulate the railroads
Est. health guidelines for food industry
Conserve natural resources &
Est. National Parks
TR the Trustbuster
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The Progressive movement needed a
President to take on the Trusts
In 1902, President Roosevelt
challenged the Northern Securities
Company (Trust)
• They sought to achieve a
monopoly of the railroads
in the Northwest
• The Supreme Court sided
with the President and the
trust was dissolved
Consumer Protection
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Backed by the public, President Roosevelt
passed the Meat Inspection Act of 1906
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The public had been sickened by the Sinclair
novel, The Jungle
The act stated that the preparation of meat
shipped over state lines would be subject to
federal inspection
Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906
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Designed to prevent the adulteration and
mislabeling of foods and pharmaceuticals
John Muir
Newlands Act of 1902
The “Roosevelt Panic” of 1907
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A panic descended upon Wall Street in
1907
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The financial world blamed the panic on
President Roosevelt for unsettling the
industries with his anti-trust tactics
Congress passed the Aldrich-Vreeland
Act in 1908
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Authorized national banks to issue
emergency currency backed by various
kinds of collateral
The Rough Rider Thunders Out
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TR decides not to
run for a 3rd term in
1908
Seeks someone to
continue his
progressive policies
William H. Taft
Who does Taft run
against in 1908?
William Howard Taft
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How did Taft fare as
President?
Compare Taft to
another former
President.
Suffered from “foot in
mouth disease”
In what two areas did
Taft make progress as
President?
Taft’s “Dollar Diplomacy”
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Improve financial
opportunities for
American businesses.
Use private capital to
further U. S. interests
overseas.
The U.S. should create
stability abroad that
would best promote
America’s commercial
interests.
U.S. policy of using economic
power to exert influence on
other countries
Taft the Trustbuster
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Taft brought 90 suits
against trusts –
double that of TR
Taft pursues an antitrust suit against
U.S. Steel Corp
TR had personally
protected this trust
Payne-Aldrich Bill
infuriates
progressives
Stage is set for
major problems in
the Rep party
TR vs. Taft
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Republican party
splinters behind
TR & Taft
Election of 1912
Taft –
Republicans
Wilson –
Democrats
Roosevelt –
Progressives
Debs –
Socialists
Taft
Wilson
Roosevelt
Debs