The Progressive President

• President from 1901-1909

• First a Republican, but began to believe that it was the job of the federal government to intervene in order to improve the lives of citizens

• Formed the Progressive Party (aka the Bull Moose Party)

• Played a big role in the change from little government intervention to increased government responsibility and regulation

Cool Facts About Teddy Roosevelt

• Youngest president ever (42)

• Avid boxer, blind in one eye

• Drank gallon of coffee a day

• Won the Nobel Peace Prize

• Wrote 44 books

• The teddy bear is named after him

• Skinny-dipped in the Potomac River while president

• Face on Mount Rushmore

• Gave the White House its name

• Only president to have a tattoo

• Helped invent modern football

• Shot in the middle of a speech – and continued

Trustbusting • Trust = legal body created when many companies merge

together, sometimes forming a monopoly

“Moving Day, March 4th”

Working Conditions

• In 1902, coal miners in PA went on strike to demand a 20% pay increase, and shorter working hours, but the mine operators refused to bargain

• 5 months into the strike, coal supply ran low everywhere

• TR decided to intervene, invited both side to the White House to settle the strike

• TR threatened to take over the coal mines if no agreement could be reached, brought in experts for both sides

• A compromise was reached, miners won a 10% pay increase and a shorter work day if they promised not to strike for 3 years

• This set a new precedent for federal gov intervening in business and the use of experts to solve business disputes

Public Health & Food Safety

• In the late 1800s, people claimed their products could do all kinds of things:

– Cure cancer, grow hair, cure blindness,

• Products were also made of many dangerous ingredients:

– Cocaine, mercury, opium, arsenic, morphine, alcohol

• Companies used unsanitary practices and intentionally mislabeled products

– Use of chemicals to hide rotten ingredients

– Renamed inactive ingredients, made up ingredients

• Pure Food & Drug Act

– Created a “truth in labeling” requirement, but didn’t outlaw harmful ingredients

– Created the Food and Drug Administration – a group dedicated to testing and monitoring food products/ingredients

Public Health & Food Safety

• Cocaine and alcohol in liquid form

• When states started passing prohibition, companies took out the alcohol and replaced it with sugar syrup

• Guess what they called it?

• Cocaine was removed in the 1920s

Conservation

• Beginning in the 1880s, as Americans began to industrialize they also began to exploit their natural resources

– Coal companies left mining refuse all over

– Cities dumped sewage into rivers and streams used for drinking water

– Farmers and lumber companies wiped out forests and plowed up prairies

– Ranchers let cattle overgraze on land

• TR felt that conservation needed to become a primary concern

– Conservation = careful and limited use of certain natural resources

– He set aside 148 million acres of protected forest

– Created over 50 national parks and wildlife sanctuaries

– Headed up irrigation, dam, and agriculture projects