Solving the Problems of the Gilded Age
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Problems of the Gilded Age
Muckrakers
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
Social Gospel Movement
The Progressives
Populists
Prohibition
Women’s Rights
Theodore Roosevelt
Accomplishments/Failures
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Strong corporations and businessmen
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Concerns grew over worker rights, safety, regulations,
corruption, etc.
 1900 = +1.7 million children under 16 working
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“Progressivism” = period of attempts to fix these
problems
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2 Key questions
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How could this best be achieved?
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What caused societies problems?
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Journalists exposed corruption
 Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives
▪ Described poverty in New York City
 Upton Sinclair, The Jungle
▪ Horrors of the Chicago meatpacking
 Ida Tarbell magazine series
▪ Exposed Rockefeller’s business tactics
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Thousands of women employed in NYC (16 – 25)
 6 day/week = 56 hour = $6
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Triangle Shirtwaist Factory caught on fire, doors
had been locked by owners
 46 women jumped to their deaths
 100+ died in flames
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Movement started with religious groups working
on “social reform”
 Focus = poverty, child labor, temperance
▪ Salvation Army
▪ YMCA
▪ Settlement houses
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Why do you think many historians have argued the
Social Gospel had a limited impact?
New group thought government was best way to make
changes to protect/change society
▪ Early success example = NY Tenement Act of 1901
 Wide collection of ideas
 Government reforms
 17th Amendment (Senators)
 Pendleton Act
 Women wanted laws protecting women & children
 Muller v. Oregon
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New political party emerged in 1890s
 Ordinary Americans vs. the elites
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Populist politics focused mostly on money
• Government ownership of the railroads
• 8 hour work day
• Graduated income tax
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Many of their desires became laws in the 1900s
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Was alcohol the cause of society’s problems?
Temperance/Prohibition movement grew in 1800s
 Movement largely led by women
 Women’s Christian Temperance Union (1911 =
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250,000)
Amendment (1919)
 Outlawed manufacturing, selling, transportation
 Lasted until 1933!
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First women’s rights meeting, 1848
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Seneca Falls, New York
Many leaders of “suffrage” movement
 2 of the most famous:
▪ Elizabeth Cody Stanton
▪ Susan B Anthony
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Movement split in 2
 Amendment vs. State governments
 Younger women vs older women
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By 1900 only 4 states granted full voting rights
 Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, Colorado
Suffrage movement grew in 20th century
19th Amendment (1920)
 Granted women right to vote
Extra Credit Movie Review
 Iron Jawed Angels
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Became President in 1901 after McKinley was killed
 First Progressive President, used “Bully Pulpit”
 Helped end coal strike in 1902
▪ Previously government had sided with bosses
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1904 campaign slogan = “Square Deal”
 Businesses, workers, and consumers should be
treated equal by the government
 Video
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Workplace inspection, working laws
Sherman Anti-Trust Act
Meat Inspection Act
Food and Drug Administration
16th Amendment
17th Amendment
18th Amendment
19th Amendment
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Majority of attempted reforms did not pass
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Progressivism = mostly white movement
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Two black scholars
1) Booker T. Washington
▪ Temporary accommodation to whites
2) W.E.B. DuBois
▪ Must agitate for equality
▪ Co-founded the NAACP
▪ National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People
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~187 lynchings each year from 1890-1899
 80% in South, 70% African Americans
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Ida B Wells campaigned to end lynching
 Congress rejected anti-lynching bills