Chapter 18 Creating a Democratic Paradise: The Progressive Era, 1895-1915.

Chapter 18

Creating a Democratic Paradise: The Progressive Era, 1895-1915

What interpretation did this painting offer the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire?

CREATING A DEMOCRATIC PARADISE: THE PROGRESSIVE ERA, 1895-1915

I. The Progressive ImpulseII. Reigning in Big BusinessIII. Competing Views on Transforming the

WorkplaceIV. Protecting Woman and ChildrenV. Reforming the Government

CREATING A DEMOCRATIC PARADISE: THE PROGRESSIVE ERA, 1895-1915

A. The Angst of the Middle ClassB. The Progressive Vision

The Progressive Impulse

The Angst of the Middle ClassWhat factors led to the emergence of

Progressivism?

What social problems did middle-class Progressives identify at the beginning of the twentieth century? How did their solutions differ from the ones embraced by the Socialists and laissez-faire industrialists?

What economic challenges did the nation face at the end of the nineteenth century?

The Progressive VisionHow did a mix of sympathy and fear spur

middle-class interest in reform?

How did the Progressive vision take shape?

What principles unified Progressives? How did they disagree?

Why did the Progressive notion of an activist, regulatory government create controversy on both the right and the left?

Social Gospel - The religious belief that Christians had a responsibility to create an ethically sound and morally upright society.

The Progressive Vision

A. Roosevelt’s Trust-bustingB. Taft and Wilson: Competing Progressive

VisionsC. Preservation versus Conservation

Reigning in Big Business

Why did Roosevelt’s personality and behavior captivate the public?

What competing visions did Roosevelt, the Supreme Court and leading industrialists offer on the trust issue?

How did exposés and caricatures in the popular media shape public views of Standard Oil?

Roosevelt’s Trust-busting

Trust-Busting - Governmental action to dissolve monopolies.

Roosevelt’s Trust-busting

Sixteenth Amendment - Sixteenth Amendment (1913) The constitutional amendment authorizing federal income taxes.

Taft and Wilson: Competing Progressive Visions

What clear philosophical differences separated the four candidates in the 1912 presidential election?

How did Wilson’s economic vision and policies differ from the ones pursued by the Roosevelt and Taft administrations?


Federal Reserve Act - The act creating a federally run Federal Reserve to serve as a “banker’s bank” that held a portion of bank funds in reserve to help member banks in time of crisis, set rates for business loans, and issued a new national paper currency.


Clayton Anti-Trust Act - The act prohibited interlocking company directories—the practice of setting up shadow companies that appeared to compete but were actually run by the same board of directors—and exempted trade unions from prosecution under the 1890 Sherman Anti-Trust Act.


Federal Trade Commission - A federal agency with the power to order companies to cease unfair trading practices whose decisions were subject to court review.


Compare Progressive-Era debates over the environment with attitudes about disappearing Indian cultures.

Preservation versus Conservation

Preservationist - An environmentalist who championed preserving nature in its unspoiled state.

Conservationist - An environmentalist who wanted to meet present economic needs and conserve natural resources for future generations.

Preservation versus Conservation

A. Capitalist Visions of Industrial Harmony

B. Working-Class Views on Capitalism

C. The Progressives’ Limited Progress

Competing Views on Transforming the Workplace

What different ways did industrialists try to end labor conflict?

How much did Ford’s innovations and paternalism benefit workers?

Capitalist Visions of Industrial Harmony

Welfare Capitalism - The notion of using benefits to gain workers’ loyalty, improve worker morale, and weaken interest in unions. scientific management The effort to use scientific knowledge to secure maximum output and profit.

Scientific Management – The effort to use scientific knowledge to secure maximum output and profit.

Capitalist Visions of Industrial Harmony

What conflicting visions divided working-class union activists?

Working-Class Views on Capitalism

Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) - This group envisioned “one big union” that welcomed all workers regardless of sex, race, ethnicity, or skill, which would one day take over all means of production in the United States.

Working-Class Views on Capitalism

How effective were the different strategies that Progressive and unions employed to reform the workplace?

The Progressives’ Limited Progress

Lochner v. New York - A Supreme Court ruling that unless long work hours directly jeopardized workers’ health, the government could not abridge an employee’s freedom to negotiate his own work schedule with his employer.


Ludlow Massacre - Colorado state troops set a striking miners’ camp ablaze, killing thirteen women and children, an act that outraged laborers throughout the nation.


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What competing views existed concerning a state’s right to regulate the workplace?

A. Women at WorkB. Stamping Out ViceC. Restoring Childhood

Protecting Women and Children

Why did the campaign for maximum work hour laws succeed for women, but fail for men?

Women at Work

Muller v. Oregon - The Supreme Court upheld maximum hour laws for female workers because protecting women’s reproductive health served the public good.

Women at Work

Evaluate the Progressive strategy for reform, giving examples of successful cross-class or bipartisan alliances they constructed.

How did visual images and investigative journalism transform Americans’ views of poverty and corruption?

What diverse concerns about alcohol helped the temperance movement gain momentum?

Stamping Out Vice

What does this advertisement reveal about middle-class ideals of childhood?

What obstacles did reformers face while trying to eliminate child labor?

Restoring Childhood


How did the composition of this photograph reinforce Hine’s message about child labor?


Did these images offer similar or different reasons to oppose child labor?

A. Containing SocialismB. Ending Government CorruptionC. Accepting Separate but Equal

Reforming the Government

What importance did the socialist movement have during the Progressive Era?

Containing Socialism

Meat Inspection Act (1906) - Law gave federal inspectors the authority to condemn meat unfit for consumption and established federal sanitary standards for meatpacking plants.

Pure Food and Drug Act (1906) - Law levied federal fines for mislabeling food or medicine.

Containing Socialism

What reforms did Progressives introduce to improve the democratic process?

Ending Government Corruption

Initiative - Provided a way, usually by gathering signatures on petitions, for the electorate to introduce legislation before state legislatures.

Referendum - Put legislative proposals on the ballot, letting the voting public decide whether a measure became law.


Recall - Used special elections to remove unpopular officials from office before their term expired

“muckrakers” - Progressive Era term for investigative journalists who wrote exposés on government and business corruption.


Seventeenth Amendment (1913) - A constitutional amendment that allowed voters, rather than state legislatures, elect federal senators.


What role did government, including presidents, the Supreme Court, and state and local governments, play during the Progressive Era?

In what ways did the Progressive reform agenda succeed? How did it fail?

Accepting Separate but Equal

How does this photograph convey the Hampton Institute’s educational philosophy?

What alternatives did critics of Booker T. Washington offer to improve life for African Americans?

Accepting Separate but Equal


Was Washington a sell-out, as Du Bois implies, or a master strategist?

Chapter 18 Creating a Democratic Paradise: The Progressive Era, 1895-1915.

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Transcript of Chapter 18 Creating a Democratic Paradise: The Progressive Era, 1895-1915.