This included—as the Times article noted—"37 million pounds that went to school-lunch programs. Many of the issues first introduced during that Progressive-Era scandal remain live wires in today's political and social climate. Just as Upton Sinclair himself learned through bitter experience, reforms could produce results that differed considerably from the original intent of the reformer.
The Humane Society sought to dramatize the plight of sick cows to win better treatment of animals, but early reaction to the scandal focused almost entirely on tightening standards over which animals should be blocked from entering the human food supply.
And no fundamental restructuring of the American beef industry today appears imminent. The economic pressures of the capitalist marketplace—the cost of land, the push to maximize output, the competition from foreign beef importers, the expense of new facilities, and the costs of removing diseased cattle from production—all work against the reformers' cause.
A century ago, Progressive reformers encountered similar setbacks. They tackled food safety along with a host of other issues: alcohol abuse, women's rights, economic concentration, corporate power, political corruption, and poverty.
But they didn't solve them. Tellingly, every one of these issues remains problematic in our own time. How do we, as a society, address these social challenges? Can the successes and failures of the Progressive reformers of a century ago provide us with guidance, or should they serve as a cautionary tale?
It includes an analysis of the internal divisions among Progressives on issues such as imperialism and how best to spread American ideals. Dawley simultaneously explores reformist efforts at home and abroad. Benjamin P. It's a biased account from a Progressive author, but nonetheless a useful one for gaining some perspective on the internal and external conflicts and controversies that surrounded the movement.
Henry Demarest Lloyd, Wealth Against Commonwealth This book, the first of several that Chicago Tribune reporter Lloyd would write, had a significant impact on labor relations and on Lloyd's own journalistic profession.
It analyzed the history of the Standard Oil Company in order to mount an attack upon all monopolies and industrialization itself. John Moody, The Truth About the Trusts Moody, a financial writer, worked in a Wall Street brokerage house for several years before writing this treatise on the rapid increase in business mergers during the Gilded Age.
Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives The first book written by Riis, a Danish-American photojournalist and social reformer, this work sought to alert middle and upper-class readers to the deplorable living conditions in the slums of working-class neighborhoods.
Lincoln Steffens, The Shame of the Cities This San Francisco-based author compiled a series of his explosive McClure's magazine articles on corrupt urban politicians in this book.
Steffens, who later turned to socialism as the antidote to the nation's ills, was a prominent muckraking journalist. Washington's Atlanta Exposition Speech , showcases the distinctive styles of post-Civil War music and offers a powerful perspective on the early recording industry. These and other settlement houses inspired the establishment of settlement schools to serve isolated rural communities in Appalachia.
Hull House : Children in line on a retaining wall at Hull House, By , Hull House had grown to 13 buildings. In , the Hull House complex was completed with the addition of a summer camp, the Bowen Country Club. With its innovative social, educational, and artistic programs, Hull House became the standard bearer for the movement that had grown, by , to nearly settlement houses nationally.
The Hull mansion and several subsequent acquisitions were continuously renovated to accommodate the changing demands of the association. The original building and one additional building, which has been moved yards, survives today.
Addams followed the example of Toynbee Hall, which was founded in in the East End of London as a center for social reform. Hull House also held concerts that were free to everyone, offered free lectures on current issues, and operated clubs for both children and adults. In the Progressive Era, when presidents such as Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson identified themselves as reformers and social activists, Addams was one of the most prominent reformers.
She helped America address and focus on issues that were of concern to mothers, such as the needs of children, local public health, and world peace. She said that if women were to be responsible for cleaning up their communities and making them better places to live, they needed to be able to vote to do so effectively. Addams became a role model for middle-class women who volunteered to uplift their communities.
She is increasingly being recognized as a member of the American Pragmatist school of philosophy. Maternalist reforms provided assistance for mothers and children, expanding the American welfare state. Aid to veterans, free grants of land, and pensions for widows and handicapped veterans, have been offered in all U.
Following World War I, provisions were made for a full-scale system of hospital and medical-care benefits for veterans. These state laws made industry and businesses responsible for compensating workers or their survivors when workers were injured or killed in connection with their jobs.
Retirement programs for mainly state and local governments date back to the nineteenth century and paid teachers, police officers, and firefighters. All of these social programs were far from universal and varied considerably from one state to another. Prior to the Great Depression, the United States had social programs that mostly centered around individual efforts, family efforts, church charities, business workers compensation, life insurance, and sick leave programs, as well as on some state tax supported social programs.
The misery and poverty of the Great Depression threatened to overwhelm all of these programs. The severe depression of the s made federal action almost a necessity, as neither the states, local communities, and businesses and industries, nor private charities had the financial resources to cope with the growing need among the American people.
Beginning in , the federal government first made loans, then grants, to states to pay for direct relief and work relief. After that, special federal emergency relief such as the Civilian Conservation Corps and other public-works programs were started. In , President Franklin D. This program was expanded several times over the years. One unique trend in the history of welfare in the United States were maternalist reforms. Beginning in the Progressive Era, experiments in public policy took the form of laws providing for state assistance for mothers with young children who did not have the financial support of a male member of the household.
These laws provided financial reimbursements and set limits on the maximum working hours for women. These reforms arose from the belief that government has an obligation and interest in protecting and improving the living standards of women and children.
To improve the conditions of women and children, these policies attempted to reconcile the conflicting roles placed on women during this time period. It was the first national government office in the world that focused solely on the well-being of children and their mothers. The legislation creating the agency was signed into law on April 9, Taft appointed Julia Lathrop as the first head of the bureau. Lathrop, a noted maternalist reformer, was the first woman ever to head a government agency in the United States.
In , Lathrop stepped down as director, and the noted child-labor reformer Grace Abbott was appointed to succeed her.
The Sherwood Act of May 11, , was the first important U. It awarded pensions to all veterans. Veterans of the Mexican-American War and Union veterans of the Civil War could receive pensions automatically at age 62, regardless of disability. Privacy Policy. Skip to main content. The Progressive Era: — Search for:. The Progressive Era. The Progressive Era The Progressive Era was a period of social activism and political reform in the United States that flourished from the s to the s.
Many Progressives sought to rid the government of corruption, and muckraking became a particular type of journalism that exposed waste, corruption, and scandal on a national level. Two of the most important outcomes of the Progressive Era were the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Amendments, the first of which outlawed the manufacturing, sale, or transport of alcohol, and the second of which enfranchised women with the right to vote.
Theodore Roosevelt is often cited as the first Progressive president, known for his trust -busting activities.
Progressives did little for civil rights or the plight of African Americans in the aftermath of Reconstruction, as the Supreme Court affirmed the constitutionality of many racist southern laws. Key Terms muckraker : A reform-oriented investigative journalist during the Progressive Era. Tarbell and Lincoln Steffens. It arose in response to industrialism and dominated American politics for the first two decades of the twentieth century.
Eighteenth Amendment : This constitutional amendment established prohibition of alcohol in Nineteenth Amendment : This constitutional amendment, ratified in , granted women the right to vote and forbade any suffrage restrictions based on gender. The Varieties of Progressivism Progressive-Era reformers sought to use the federal government to make sweeping changes in politics, education, economics, and society.
Learning Objectives Describe the theory behind Progressivism. Key Takeaways Key Points Progressivism arose as a response to the vast changes brought about by modernization.
Progressives believed that the Constitution was a set of loose guidelines and that the scope of the federal government should extend into society to protect it from things such as trusts.
Education was democratized during this era: Progressive educators, such as John Dewey, wanted every child to have an education and sought to create effective standardized tests to measure how children were learning. Progressives agreed that regulating business was important, but they disagreed about whether that would be best served by breaking up monopolies or by allowing them to exist with increased regulation.
Key Terms progressivism : A philosophy that asserts that advancements in science, technology, economic development, and social organization are vital to improve the human condition. The Progressives believed in the Hamiltonian concept of positive government, of a national government directing the destinies of the nation at home and abroad. They had little but contempt for the strict construction of the Constitution by conservative judges, who would restrict the power of the national government to act against social evils and to extend the blessings of democracy to less favored lands.
The real enemy was particularism, state rights, limited government. Learning Objectives Explain the concept of the Social Gospel. Social justice issues were especially important to Social Gospel reformers. Social Gospel workers were post-millennialist, believing that Christ would return to Earth after humankind had worked through its sins.
Key Terms Social Gospel : A Protestant Christian intellectual movement that was most prominent in the early twentieth century United States and Canada that applied Christian ethics to social problems. Key Takeaways Key Points The s and early s witnessed a profound social and political reaction to the Gilded Age, the period between the early s and late s that was characterized by excesses and corruption.
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Afghanistan and Iraq wars. The Progressive Movement was initiated as a response to political and corporate abuses at the turn of the Twentieth Century. Religious groups, members of the press, and radical political groups all cried out for reform, with solutions ranging from subtle reforms of the American capitalist economy, to a call for the creation of a socialist government.
A number of social reformers also worked to reform what they viewed as the ills negatively impacting United States society: Social Reformers Jane Addams Pioneer in the field of social work who founded the settlement house movement through the establishment of Hull House in Chicago, Illinois.
Margaret Sanger Educated urban poor about the benefits of family planning through birth control. She founded the organization that became Planned Parenthood. Booker T. Washinton Former slave who founded the Tuskegee Institute that focused on teaching African-Americans trade skills to earn a living and gain the trust of white society.
DuBois Founder of the NAACP , and a Harvard-educated professor who focused on the need for a traditional liberal arts education for African-Americans who could then insist upon equal treatment and rights from white society.
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