20th Century
Shen
Name: _____________________________
Progressive Era Reforms and Reformers
I.
Presidential Reforms
a.
Progressive Era presidents saw themselves as Progressives and worked to improve govt. Much like other
Progressive reformers, the presidents themselves differed on what it meant to be progressive.
i. Presidents Teddy Roosevelt and William H. Taft sought greater involvement by the federal
government in an effort to end the era of laissez-faire.
ii. Woodrow Wilson asserted that in order to truly be progressive, states and localities needed greater
control of govt. This would ensure citizens had the ability to effect change in a manner which made
sense to them. His administration favored less direct govt. intervention.
b. Roosevelt involved himself in a number of causes:
i. Northern Securities Case: (1901-1902) Roosevelt told his attorney general to file suit under the
Sherman Anti-Trust Act to dissolve the NSC a railroad monopoly. Roosevelt thought some
businessmen were arrogant & greedy and wanted to send a message to the business community that
they couldn’t deal with the president like he was just another tycoon. Govt won the case and
moved on to prosecute some of the largest corporations including Standard Oil Co. Significance:
Roosevelt’s anti-trust policy brought life back into the Sherman Anti-Trust Act and increased the
federal govt’s role as a regulator.
ii. William Howard Taft cont. TR’s legacy and filed even more anti-trust lawsuits in 4 years than TR
did in 7 years.
iii. United Mine Workers’ Strike: (1902) the United Mine Workers went on strike because of low
wages, long hours, and unsafe working conditions. Unlike his predecessors, Teddy Roosevelt saw
himself as a mediator/regulator between business and labor. Mine owners refused to talk to strikers
– instead hired strikebreakers. Roosevelt called union representatives to the White House with the
mine owners - weeks later the miners went back to work with a 10% pay raise. Showed Roosevelt’s
willingness to intervene in strikes (first time a president made a habit of mediating between
business and workers.)
c. Woodrow Wilson created the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to make sure businesses complied with
federal trade regulations (had enough power to move directly against corporations accused of restricting
competition.) He also passed the Clayton Anti-Trust Act of 1914 which spelled out specific activities big
businesses could not do to restrain trade = strengthened the nation’s anti-trust laws (without hurting unions
like the Sherman Anti-Trust Act had)
i. Prohibited unfair trading practices
ii. Outlawed the interlocking directorate
iii. Made it illegal for corporations to purchase stock in other corporations if this tended to reduce
competition
iv. Controversial b/c labor said the bill had no provision exempting labor unions from prosecution
under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (later added a section exempting labor and farm organizers)
II.
Muckrakers
a. DEFINE: ________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
b. Issues muckrakers cared about:
i. Temperance/Prohibition: sought to abolish or severely limit access to ________________.
Saw saloons as the center of a subversive movement to take over the U.S. Believed that
drinking led to personal tragedies and weakened those who were already morally corrupt
inciting them to engage in other evils.
ii. Anti-Vice: Purity Crusaders: opposed vice (drugs, gambling, prostitution, crime) and
wanted to rid cities of immoral activities
1. 1874 the NY Society for the Suppression of Vice won the passage of a law
prohibiting sending through the mail materials deemed obscene.
2. Crusaders also attacked political machines – saying that machine-controlled police
and profited from vice (paying off police to ignore gambling & prostitution rings.)
iii. Political corruption: Lincoln Steffens became famous for a series of articles on corruption in
various American cities entitled "The Shame of the Cities,” which portrayed a pattern of
corruption in municipal government throughout the country.
1. For example? ____________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
iv. Anti-child labor & workplace reforms:
1. Mueller v. Oregon (1908) led to what? ________________________________
_______________________________________________________________
2. Taft supported an 8 hour work day and reforms to make mining safer.
3. Anti-child labor laws unsuccessful until 1930s.
v. Living Conditions: Jacob Riis’ How the Other Half Lives
vi. Race relations & lynching: widespread segregation in the South. Ida B. Wells sought passage
of federal anti-lynching legislation – she was unsuccessful – WHY?
vii. Birth control: Margaret Sanger gave up nursing to dedicate herself to the distribution of
birth control information. She encountered resistance in the form of the Comstock Act of
1873 (forbid distribution of birth control devices and information.) Set up nation’s first
birth control clinic in 1916.
viii. Working Conditions: Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle (1904) wanted to expose the exploitation
of the poor and oppressed working in the Chicago stockyards, however, his description of
contaminated meat caught the public’s attention and encouraged an outcry for better
regulations in the meat packing industry.
1. Roosevelt ordered a study of meatpacking industry after reading The Jungle and
used the report to pressure Congress and meatpackers to accept a bill to regulate
the meatpacking industry
a. Meat Inspection Act of 1906 enforced some federal inspection and
mandated sanitary conditions in all companies selling meat in interstate
commerce, meatpackers struck down the provision requiring dating of the
meat. Helped to restore public confidence in the meat industry and
illustrated how muckrakers and Progressives could bring about a public
outcry that could eventually lead to reform/legislation
2. Reformers, writers, govt officials used the public outcry around The Jungle to push
for legislation to regulate the sale of food & drugs. Many packaged/canned foods
contained dangerous chemicals and impurities. Congress passed the Pure Food
and Drug Act of 1906 to correct some of the worst abuses.
c. WHAT TACTICS WERE EMPLOYED BY MUCKRAKERS TO ACHIEVE THEIR GOALS?
(LIST)