Fill - Free fillable The Origins of Progressivism (Caggia Social Studies) PDF form

512 CHAPTER 17

Terms & Names

MAIN IDEA

One American's Story

•progressive

movement

•Florence Kelley

•prohibition

•muckraker

•scientiﬁc

management

•Robert M.

La Follette

•initiative

•referendum

•recall

•Seventeenth

Amendment

Political, economic, and

social change in late 19th

century America led to broad

progressive reforms.

Progressive reforms in areas

such as labor and voting rights

reinforced democratic

principles that continue to exist

today.

WHY IT MATTERS NOW

Camella Teoli was just 12 years old when she began working in a

Lawrence, Massachusetts, textile mill to help support her family. Soon

after she started, a machine used for twisting cotton into thread tore off

part of her scalp. The young Italian immigrant spent seven months in

the hospital and was scarred for life.

Three years later, when 20,000 Lawrence mill workers went on strike

for higher wages, Camella was selected to testify before a congression-

al committee investigating labor conditions such as workplace safety

and underage workers. When asked why she had gone on strike, Camella

answered simply, “Because I didn’t get enough to eat at home.” She

explained how she had gone to work before reaching the legal age of 14.

A PERSONAL VOICE CAMELLA TEOLI

“ I used to go to school, and then a man came up to my house and asked my

father why I didn’t go to work, so my father says I don’t know whether she is 13

or 14 years old. So, the man say You give me $4 and I will make the papers come

from the old country [Italy] saying [that] you are 14. So, my father gave him

the $4, and in one month came the papers that I was 14. I went to

work, and about two weeks [later] got hurt in my head.

”

—at congressional hearings, March 1912

After nine weeks of striking, the mill workers won the sympathy of

the nation as well as ﬁve to ten percent pay raises. Stories like Camella’s

set off a national investigation of labor conditions, and reformers across

the country organized to address the problems of industrialization.

Four Goals of Progressivism

At the dawn of the new century, middle-class reformers addressed many of the

problems that had contributed to the social upheavals of the 1890s. Journalists and

writers exposed the unsafe conditions often faced by factory workers, including

The Origins of

Progressivism

Mill workers on

strike in 1912

in Lawrence,

Massachusetts

A CHILD ON

STRIKE

The Testimony of

Camella Teoli,

Mill Girl

▼

Page 1 of 7

513

women and children. Intellectuals questioned the dominant

role of large corporations in American society. Political

reformers struggled to make government more responsive

to the people. Together, these reform efforts formed the

progressive movement, which aimed to return control of

the government to the people, restore economic opportuni-

ties, and correct injustices in American life.

Even though reformers never completely agreed on the

problems or the solutions, each of their progressive efforts

shared at least one of the following goals:

• protecting social welfare

• promoting moral improvement

• creating economic reform

• fostering efﬁciency

PROTECTING SOCIAL WELFARE

Many social welfare

reformers worked to soften some of the harsh conditions of

industrialization. The Social Gospel and settlement house

movements of the late 1800s, which aimed to help the poor

through community centers, churches, and social services,

continued during the Progressive Era and inspired even more

reform activities.

The Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), for

example, opened libraries, sponsored classes, and built

swimming pools and handball courts. The Salvation Army

fed poor people in soup kitchens, cared for children in nurs-

eries, and sent “slum brigades” to instruct poor immigrants

in middle-class values of hard work and temperance.

In addition, many women were inspired by the settle-

ment houses to take action. Florence Kelley became an

advocate for improving the lives of women and children. She

was appointed chief inspector of factories for Illinois after she

had helped to win passage of the Illinois Factory Act in 1893.

The act, which prohibited child labor and limited women’s

working hours, soon became a model for other states.

PROMOTING MORAL IMPROVEMENT

Other reformers felt that morality, not

the workplace, held the key to improving the lives of poor people. These reform-

ers wanted immigrants and poor city dwellers to uplift themselves by improving

their personal behavior. Prohibition, the banning of alcoholic beverages, was

one such program.

Prohibitionist groups feared that alcohol was undermining American morals.

Founded in Cleveland in 1874, the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union

(WCTU) spearheaded the crusade for prohibition. Members

advanced their cause by entering saloons, singing, pray-

ing, and urging saloonkeepers to stop selling alco-

hol. As momentum grew, the Union was trans-

formed by Frances Willard from a small midwest-

ern religious group in 1879 to a national organi-

zation. Boasting 245,000 members by 1911, the

WCTU became the largest women’s group in

the nation’s history.

WCTU members followed Willard’s “do

everything” slogan and began opening

kindergartens for immigrants, visiting

FLORENCE KELLEY

1859–1932

The daughter of an antislavery

Republican congressman from

Pennsylvania, Florence Kelley

became a social reformer whose

sympathies lay with the power-

less, especially working women

and children. During a long career,

Kelley pushed the government to

solve America’s social problems.

In 1899, Kelley became general

secretary of the National

Consumers’ League, where she

lobbied to improve factory condi-

tions. “Why,” Kelley pointedly

asked while campaigning for a

federal child-labor law, “are seals,

bears, reindeer, ﬁsh, wild game in

the national parks, buffalo, [and]

migratory birds all found suitable

for federal protection, but not

children?”

In the 1890s, Carry Nation

worked for prohibition by

walking into saloons,

scolding the customers,

and using her hatchet

to destroy bottles

of liquor.

▼

A. Possible

Answer Many

women believed

this was an area

in which they

could make a

difference in

society.

Vocabulary

temperance:

refraining from

alcohol

consumption

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Motives

Why did the

prohibition

movement appeal

to so many

women?

Page 2 of 7

inmates in prisons and asylums, and working for suffrage.

The WCTU reform activities, like those of the settlement-

house movement, provided women with expanded public

roles, which they used to justify giving women voting rights.

Sometimes efforts at prohibition led to trouble with

immigrant groups. Such was the case with the Anti-Saloon

League, founded in 1895. As members sought to close

saloons to cure society’s problems, tension arose between

them and many immigrants, whose customs often includ-

ed the consumption of alcohol. Additionally, saloons ﬁlled

a number of roles within the immigrant community such as

cashing paychecks and serving meals.

CREATING ECONOMIC REFORM

As moral reformers

sought to change individual behavior, a severe economic

panic in 1893 prompted some Americans to question the

capitalist economic system. As a result, some Americans,

especially workers, embraced socialism. Labor leader

Eugene V. Debs, who helped organize the American

Socialist Party in 1901, commented on the uneven balance

among big business, government, and ordinary people

under the free-market system of capitalism.

A PERSONAL

VOICE EUGENE V. DEBS

“ Competition was natural enough at one time, but do you

think you are competing today? Many of you think you are

competing. Against whom? Against [oil magnate John D.]

Rockefeller? About as I would if I had a wheelbarrow and com-

peted with the Santa Fe [railroad] from here to Kansas City.

”

—Debs: His Life, Writings and Speeches

Though most progressives distanced themselves from socialism, they saw the

truth of many of Debs’s criticisms. Big business often received favorable treatment

from government ofﬁcials and politicians and could use its economic power to

limit competition.

Journalists who wrote about the corrupt side of business and public life in mass

circulation magazines during the early 20th century became known as muckrakers

(

mOkPrAkQr). (The term refers to John Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress,” in which a

character is so busy using a rake to clean up the muck of this world that he does not

raise his eyes to heaven.) In her “History of the Standard Oil Company,” a month-

ly serial in McClure’s Magazine, the writer Ida M. Tarbell described the company’s

cutthroat methods of eliminating competition. “Mr. Rockefeller has systematically

played with loaded dice,” Tarbell charged, “and it is doubtful if there has been a

time since 1872 when he has run a race with a competitor and started fair.”

FOSTERING EFFICIENCY

Many progressive leaders put their faith in experts

and scientiﬁc principles to make society and the workplace more efﬁcient. In

defending an Oregon law that limited women factory and laundry workers to a

ten-hour day, lawyer Louis D. Brandeis paid little attention to legal argument.

Instead, he focused on data produced by social scientists documenting the high

costs of long working hours for both the individual and society. This type of argu-

ment—the “Brandeis brief”—would become a model for later reform litigation.

Within industry, Frederick Winslow Taylor began using time and motion stud-

ies to improve efﬁciency by breaking manufacturing tasks into simpler parts.

“Taylorism” became a management fad, as industry reformers applied these scien-

tiﬁc management studies to see just how quickly each task could be performed.

514 CHAPTER 17

HISTORICAL

ANTI–SALOON LEAGUE

Quietly founded by progressive

women in 1895, the Anti-Saloon

League called itself “the Church

in action against the saloon.”

Whereas early temperance

efforts had asked individuals to

change their ways, the Anti-

Saloon League worked to pass

laws to force people to change

and to punish those who drank.

The Anti-Saloon League

endorsed politicians who opposed

“Demon Rum,” no matter which

party they belonged to or where

they stood on other issues. It also

organized statewide referendums

to ban alcohol. Between 1900

and 1917, voters in nearly half of

the states—mostly in the South

and the West—prohibited the

sale, production, and use of alco-

hol. Individual towns, city wards,

and rural areas also voted them-

selves “dry.”

Background

See capitalism

and socialism

on pages R38

and R44 in the

Economics

Handbook.

B. Answer

Muckrakers

exposed the

dangers and

corruption of

industrial life to

the public.

MAIN IDEA

Evaluating

What

contribution did

muckrakers make

to the reform

movement?

Page 3 of 7

However, not all workers could work at the same rate, and although the intro-

duction of the assembly lines did speed up production, the system required peo-

ple to work like machines. This caused a high worker turnover, often due to

injuries suffered by fatigued workers. To keep automobile workers

happy and to prevent strikes, Henry Ford reduced the workday to

eight hours and paid workers ﬁve dollars a day. This incentive attract-

ed thousands of workers, but they exhausted themselves. As one

homemaker complained in a letter to Henry Ford in 1914, “That $5

is a blessing—a bigger one than you know but oh they earn it.”

Such efforts at improving efﬁciency, an important part of pro-

gressivism, targeted not only industry, but government as well.

Cleaning Up Local Government

Cities faced some of the most obvious social problems of the new industrial age.

In many large cities, political bosses rewarded their supporters with jobs and kick-

backs and openly bought votes with favors and bribes. Efforts to reform city pol-

itics stemmed in part from the desire to make government more efﬁcient and

more responsive to its constituents. But those efforts also grew from distrust of

immigrants’ participation in politics.

REFORMING LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Natural disasters sometimes played an

important role in prompting reform of city governments. In 1900, a hurricane

and tidal wave almost demolished Galveston, Texas. The politicians on the city

council botched the huge relief and rebuilding job so badly that the Texas legis-

lature appointed a ﬁve-member commission of experts to take over. Each expert

took charge of a different city department, and soon Galveston was rebuilt. This

success prompted the city to adopt the commission idea as a form of government,

and by 1917, 500 cities had followed Galveston's example.

Another natural disaster—a ﬂood in Dayton, Ohio, in 1913—led to the wide-

spread adoption of the council-manager form of government. Staunton, Virginia,

had already pioneered this system, in which people elected a city council to make

laws. The council in turn appointed a manager, typically a person with training

and experience in public administration, to run the city’s departments. By 1925,

managers were administering nearly 250 cities.

The Progressive Era 515

“ Everybody will

be able to afford

[a car], and about

everyone will have

one.”

HENRY FORD, 1909

Workers at the

Ford ﬂywheel

factory cope with

the demanding

pace of the

assembly line to

earn ﬁve dollars a

day—a good

wage in 1914.

▼

C. Answer

Scientiﬁc

management

reformers

worked to

improve efﬁ-

ciency and

productivity,

while other

reformers aimed

at improving

behavior or

addressing

economic

inequality.

MAIN IDEA

Contrasting

Contrast the

goals of scientiﬁc

management with

other progressive

reforms.

Page 4 of 7

REFORM MAYORS

In some cities, mayors such as Hazen Pingree of Detroit,

Michigan (1890–1897), and Tom Johnson of Cleveland, Ohio (1901–1909), intro-

duced progressive reforms without changing how government was organized.

Concentrating on economics, Pingree instituted a fairer tax structure, low-

ered fares for public transportation, rooted out corruption, and set up a system of

work relief for the unemployed. Detroit city workers built schools, parks, and a

municipal lighting plant.

Johnson was only one of 19 socialist mayors who worked to institute pro-

gressive reforms in America’s cities. In general, these mayors focused on dismiss-

ing corrupt and greedy private owners of utilities—such as gasworks, waterworks,

and transit lines—and converting the utilities to publicly owned enterprises.

Johnson believed that citizens should play a more active role in city government.

He held meetings in a large circus tent and invited them to question ofﬁcials

about how the city was managed.

Reform at the State Level

Local reforms coincided with progressive efforts at the state level. Spurred by pro-

gressive governors, many states passed laws to regulate railroads, mines, mills,

telephone companies, and other large businesses.

REFORM GOVERNORS

Under the progressive Republican

leadership of Robert M. La Follette, Wisconsin led the

way in regulating big business. “Fighting Bob” La Follette

served three terms as governor before he entered the U.S.

Senate in 1906. He explained that, as governor, he did not

mean to “smash corporations, but merely to drive them out

of politics, and then to treat them exactly the same as other

people are treated.”

La Follette’s major target was the railroad industry. He

taxed railroad property at the same rate as other business prop-

erty, set up a commission to regulate rates, and forbade rail-

roads to issue free passes to state ofﬁcials. Other reform gover-

nors who attacked big business interests included Charles B.

Aycock of North Carolina and James S. Hogg of Texas.

PROTECTING WORKING CHILDREN

As the number of

child workers rose dramatically, reformers worked to protect

workers and to end child labor. Businesses hired children

because they performed unskilled jobs for lower wages and

because children’s small hands made them more adept at

handling small parts and tools. Immigrants and rural

migrants often sent their children to work because they

viewed their children as part of the family economy. Often

wages were so low for adults that every family member need-

ed to work to pull the family out of poverty.

In industrial settings, however, children were more

prone to accidents caused by fatigue. Many developed seri-

ous health problems and suffered from stunted growth.

Formed in 1904, the National Child Labor Committee

sent investigators to gather evidence of children working in

harsh conditions. They then organized exhibitions with pho-

tographs and statistics to dramatize the children’s plight. They

were joined by labor union members who argued that child

labor lowered wages for all workers. These groups pressured

516 CHAPTER 17

JAMES S. HOGG, TEXAS

GOVERNOR (1891–1895)

Among the most colorful of the

reform governors was James S.

Hogg of Texas. Hogg helped to

drive illegal insurance companies

from the state and championed

antitrust legislation. His chief inter-

est, however, was in regulating the

railroads. He pointed out abuses

in rates—noting, for example, that

it cost more to ship lumber from

East Texas to Dallas than to ship it

all the way to Nebraska. A railroad

commission, established largely as

a result of his efforts, helped

increase milling and manufacturing

in Texas by lowering freight rates.

HISTORICAL

D. Answer The

commission

system and

council-manag-

er system were

introduced;

some reform

mayors made

citizens more

active in manag-

ing cities.

E. Answer

Businesses

exploited chil-

dren, paying

them low wages

and forcing

them to work

long hours in

dangerous con-

ditions.

MAIN IDEA

Summarizing

How did city

government

change during the

Progressive Era?

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Causes

Why did

reformers seek to

end child labor?

Page 5 of 7

national politicians to pass the Keating-Owen Act in 1916. The act prohibited the

transportation across state lines of goods produced with child labor.

Two years later the Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional due to

interference with states’ rights to regulate labor. Reformers did, however, succeed

in nearly every state by effecting legislation that banned child labor and set max-

imum hours.

EFFORTS TO LIMIT WORKING HOURS

The Supreme Court sometimes took a

more sympathetic view of the plight of workers. In the 1908 case of Muller v.

Oregon, Louis D. Brandeis—assisted by Florence Kelley and Josephine Goldmark—

persuasively argued that poor working women were much more economically

insecure than large corporations. Asserting that women required the state’s pro-

tection against powerful employers, Brandeis convinced the Court to uphold an

Oregon law limiting women to a ten-hour workday. Other states responded by

enacting or strengthening laws to reduce women’s hours of work. A similar

Brandeis brief in Bunting v. Oregon in 1917 persuaded the Court to uphold a ten-

hour workday for men.

Progressives also succeeded in winning workers’ compensation to aid the

families of workers who were hurt or killed on the job. Beginning with Maryland

in 1902, one state after another passed legislation requiring employers to pay ben-

eﬁts in death cases.

The Progressive Era 517

History Through

IMAGES OF CHILD LABOR

In 1908, Lewis Hine quit his teaching job to docu-

ment child labor practices. Hine’s photographs and

descriptions of young laborers—some only three

years old—were widely distributed and displayed

in exhibits. His compelling images of exploitation

helped to convince the public of the need for child

labor regulations.

Hine devised a host of clever tactics to gain

access to his subjects, such as learning shop

managers’ schedules and arriving during their

lunch breaks. While talking casually with the chil-

dren, he secretly scribbled notes on paper hidden

in his pocket.

Because of their small size, spindle boys and girls (top) were

forced to climb atop moving machinery to replace parts. For four-

year-old Mary (left), shucking two pots of oysters was a typical

day’s work.

SKILLBUILDER

Interpreting Visual Sources

Lewis Hine believed in the power of photography to move

people to action. What elements of these photographs do

you ﬁnd most striking?

Why do you think Hine was a successful photographer?

SEE SKILLBUILDER HANDBOOK, PAGE R23.

Page 6 of 7

518 CHAPTER 17

REFORMING ELECTIONS

In some cases, ordinary citizens won state reforms.

William S. U’Ren prompted his state of Oregon to adopt the secret ballot (also

called the Australian ballot), the initiative, the referendum, and the recall. The ini-

tiative and referendum gave citizens the power to create laws. Citizens could peti-

tion to place an initiative—a bill originated by the people rather than lawmak-

ers—on the ballot. Then voters, instead of the legislature, accepted or rejected the

initiative by referendum, a vote on the initiative. The recall enabled voters to

remove public ofﬁcials from elected positions by forcing them to face another elec-

tion before the end of their term if enough voters asked for it. By 1920, 20 states

had adopted at least one of these procedures.

In 1899, Minnesota passed the ﬁrst mandatory statewide primary system. This

enabled voters, instead of political machines, to choose candidates for public ofﬁce

through a special popular election. About two-thirds of the states had adopted

some form of direct primary by 1915.

DIRECT ELECTION OF SENATORS

It was the success of the direct primary that

paved the way for the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution. Before

1913, each state’s legislature had chosen its own United States senators, which put

even more power in the hands of party bosses and wealthy corporation heads. To

force senators to be more responsive to the public, progressives pushed for the

popular election of senators. At ﬁrst, the Senate refused to go along with the idea,

but gradually more and more states began allowing voters to nominate senatori-

al candidates in direct primaries. As a result, Congress approved the Seventeenth

Amendment in 1912. Its ratiﬁcation in 1913 made direct election of senators the

law of the land.

Government reform—including efforts to give Americans more of a voice in

electing their legislators and creating laws—drew increased numbers of women

into public life. It also focused renewed attention on the issue of woman suffrage.

Economic Moral

Progressive

Reforms

Political

Social

Welfare

F. Answer

Members of the

Senate were no

longer appoint-

ed by state leg-

islatures, over

whom special

interests had

inﬂuence.

Instead sena-

tors were elect-

ed by popular

vote.

•progressive movement

•Florence Kelley

•prohibition

•muckraker

•scientiﬁc management

•Robert M. La Follette

•initiative

•referendum

•recall

•Seventeenth Amendment

1. TERMS & NAMES For each term or name, write a sentence explaining its signiﬁcance.

MAIN IDEA

2. TAKING NOTES

Copy the web below on your

paper. Fill it in with examples of

organizations that worked for

reform in the areas named.

Which group was most

successful and why?

CRITICAL THINKING

3. FORMING GENERALIZATIONS

In what ways might Illinois,

Wisconsin, and Oregon all be

considered trailblazers in

progressive reform? Support

your answers. Think About:

• legislative and electoral

reforms at the state level

• the leadership of William

U’Ren and Robert La

Follette

• Florence Kelley’s appoint-

ment as chief inspector of

factories for Illinois

4. INTERPRETING VISUAL SOURCES

This cartoon shows Carry Nation inside a

saloon that she has attacked. Do you think

the cartoonist had a favorable or unfavorable

opinion of this prohibitionist? Explain.

MAIN IDEA

Summarizing

Summarize

the impact of the

direct election of

senators.

Page 7 of 7

Download
Save PDF to desktop

Email
Email completed PDF

Send for Signing
Email for others to sign

Print
Print document

NAME

The Origins of Progressivism (Caggia Social Studies)

View Audit Log
Print With Audit Log
Duplicate Document

Fill Online, Printable, Fillable, Blank The Origins of Progressivism (Caggia Social Studies) Form

Related forms

Fillable The Origins of Progressivism (Caggia Social Studies)

Fill Online, Printable, Fillable, Blank The Origins of Progressivism (Caggia Social Studies) Form

Related forms

First 20 documents completely FREE!