Lecture Notes: The Progressive Era (Part Two)

Overview

• Timeframe: 1900 to 1917
• Reaction to problems from the Gilded Age
  • Large business and necessary government intervention
• Goals of Progressivism:
  • Greater democracy
  • Efficiency
  • Regulation
  • Social justice

Reform Efforts

Influenced by Upton Sinclair's The Jungle

• Focus on workers' conditions and social upheaval
• Public response focused on meatpacking industry sanitation
• Roosevelt's actions:
  • 1906 Meat Inspection Act
  • Pure Food and Drug Act
  • Led to FDA's creation

African American Progressivism

Key Figures

• Booker T. Washington:
  • Advocated for education as a path to economic progress
• W.E.B. Du Bois:
  • Demanded immediate equal rights
  • Led Niagara Movement, founding NAACP in 1909
• Ida B. Wells:
  • Anti-Lynching Society

The Great Migration

• 1910-1930: Movement of nearly a million Southern Blacks to Northern cities
• Driven by discrimination and economic opportunities

Challenges

• Continued segregation and rise of the new KKK
• De jure vs. de facto segregation

Presidential Influence

Theodore Roosevelt

• Presidency after McKinley, re-elected in 1904
• Square Deal:
  • Control of corporations
  • Consumer protection
  • Conservation of natural resources
• Established national forests and parks

William Taft

• Roosevelt's chosen successor
• Continued trust-busting and conservation
• Issues with Republican split

Woodrow Wilson

• Southern president after Zachary Taylor
• Attacked trusts, tariffs, banks
• Federal Reserve Act and Clayton Antitrust Act
• Shifted focus due to WWI

Socialism and Labor

• Socialist Party: More radical than progressives
• Public ownership of utilities and industries
• Key Figures:
  • Eugene V. Debs
  • IWW (Industrial Workers of the World)

Amendments and Legacy

• Four Progressive Amendments:
  • 16th: Income tax
  • 17th: Direct election of senators
  • 18th: Prohibition of alcohol
  • 19th: Women's suffrage
• Progressive Era achievements:
  • Improved fairness, honesty, and efficiency
  • Interrupted by WWI

Additional Notes

• Third-party impacts on elections (e.g., Bull Moose Party)
• Wilson's re-election and subsequent entry into WWI

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Key Takeaways: The Progressive Era introduced significant governmental reforms aimed at addressing social and economic issues stemming from the Gilded Age. It saw active involvement in regulating industry, advancing civil rights (albeit unevenly), and initiating key constitutional amendments. However, the era's momentum was stymied by the onset of World War I.