CHAPTER 22: THE PROGRESSIVE ERA, 1900-1920 (#1)
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McClure’s Magazine sent out a reporter and in St. Louis – found a trail of corruption linking politics and
some of the city’s respected business leaders
o same theme: corruption in American life
 “capitalists, workingmen, politicians, citizens – all breaking the law, or letting it be
broken”
- muckrakers – an unflattering term coined by Theodore Roosevelt in 1906
o was used to describe the practice of exposing the corruption of public and prominent figures
 use of the term spread quickly
- muckraking flourished from 1903 to 1909 – while it did, good writers and bad investigated almost
every corner of American life: from government, labor unions, big business, Wall Street, health care,
the food industry, child labor, women’s rights, prostitution, ghetto living, and life insurance
- muckrakers – were a journalistic voice of a larger movement in American society
o known as progressives – the era lasted from the mid-1890s through World War I
 showed the worry about the state of society, the effects of industrialization and
urbanization, social disorder, political corruption, and other issues
 often had a sense of crisis in urgency in their cause
The Changing Face of Industrialism
- 1901 – economy reached full capacity for the first time in years
o millions of Americans still suffered from poverty and disease
o racism against African Americans was a problem in both the South and North
o increasing hostility against immigrants from southern & eastern Europe & from Mexico and Asia
- people believed technology and enterprise would shape a better life
- new – new poetry, new cinema, new history, new democracy, new woman, new art, new immigration,
new morality, and new city
- mass – teeming cities, burgeoning corporations, and other marks of the mass society
o mass production, read mass circulation newspapers and magazines, used mass transit from the
growing spiral of suburbs into the central cities
- industries became mammoth – growth of giant businesses gave rise to a widespread fear of “trusts”
and a desire among many progressive reformers to break them up or regulate them
- The Innovative Model T
o automobile industry was one of those that led the way in large-scale business
 Ransom E. Olds – turned out 5,000 Olds runabouts in 1904 using an assembly line
o 1903 – Henry Ford and a group of associates had established the Ford Motor Company – the
firm that would transform the business
 modern economy: a smaller unit profit on a large number of sales meant enormous
revenues
 1908 – introduced the Model T
o key was mass production: Ford copies the techniques of meatpackers who moved animal
carcasses along overhead trolleys from station to station
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1913 – set up moving assembly lines in Highland Park, Michigan that reduced the time
and cost of producing cars
 strove for a nonstop flow from raw material to finished product
o workers assembled a car in 93 minutes
o 1916 – Federal Aid Roads act set the framework for road building in the 20 th century, and act
that wasn’t noticed then
 required every state wanting federal funds to establish a highway department to plan
routes, oversee construction, and maintain roads
 federal government would pay half the coast of building the roads
 produced a national network of two-lane all-weather intercity roads
The Burgeoning Trusts
o capital and organization became increasingly important
 led to the formation of a growing number of trusts
 series of mergers and consolidations swept the economy
o oligopoly – control of a commodity by a small number of large, powerful companies
o investment bankers - able to finance the mergers and reorganizations, began to play a greater
role in the economy
o massive business growth set off a decade-long debate over what government should do about
the trusts
 working for reform – progressives – often drew on the managerial methods of a
business world they sought to replace
Managing the Machines
o mass production changed the direction of American industry
 size, system, organization, and marketing became more and more important
o businesses established industrial research laboratories where scientists and engineers
developed new products
o business became large-scale, mechanized, and managed
 industries that processes materials – were increasingly automated and operated
continuously
 trained professional managers supervised production flow
o workers lost control of the work pace
o “scientific” labor management – sought to extract maximum efficiency from each worker
o two major reforms
 management must take responsibility for job-related knowledge and classify it into
“rules, laws, and formulae”
 management should control the workplace “through enforced standardization of
methods, enforced adoption of the best implements and working conditions, and
enforced cooperation”
o in some industries workers earned more
 suffered important losses as well
o seemed to become part of the machinery, moving to the pace and needs of their mechanical
pacesetters
 might easily lose pride of workmanship
o goal was to establish routine
 jobs became not only monotonous but dangerous
o a fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company in New York focused nationwide attention on unsafe
working conditions
 five hundred men and women tried to use exits to escape the flames, but most exit
doors were closed, locked by the company to prevent theft and shut out union
organizers
 146 people died
 8,000 people marched silently in the rain in a funeral procession up Fifth Avenue
o Rose Schneiderman – a 29-year-old organizer for the Women’s Trade Union League spoke to
protest factory working conditions
o outcry after the fire led New York’s governor to appoint a State Factory Investigating
Commission – recommended laws to shorten the workweek and improve safety in factories and
stores
Society’s Masses
- mass production not only improved lives, but sometimes cost lives
o labor force increased tremendously to keep up with the demand for workers in the factories,
mines, and forests
- immigration soared, but the less skilled tended to be the less fortunate
o many people fought to make a living and fought to improve their lot
- Better Times on the Farm
o rural free delivery – begun in 1893, helped diminish the farmers’ sense of isolation and changed
farm life
o delivery of mail to the farm door opened that door to a wider world
 exposed farmers to urban thinking, national advertising, and political events
o parcel post (1913) – allowed the sending of packages through the US mail
o better roads, mail-order catalogs, and other innovations knit farmers into the larger society
o farmers still had problems
 land prices rose with crop prices, and farm tenancy increased, especially in the South
o farm-bred diseases
 Rockefeller Sanitary Commission – acting on recent scientific discoveries, began a
sanitation campaign that wiped out the hookworm disease
 US Public Health Service – began to work on rural malaria
o arid West – irrigation transformed the land as the federal government and private landholders
joined to import water from mountain watersheds
 Newlands Act of 1902 – secretary of the interior formed the US Reclamation Service –
gathered a staff of thousands of engineers and technicians
 dams and canals channeled water into areas like California’s Imperial Valley
- Women at Work
o women worked in larger and larger numbers
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o single women outnumbered married women by 7:1, but more than 1/3 of married women
were working
 most held service jobs
 a small number held higher-paying jobs as professionals or managers
o few women taught in colleges and universities – those that did were expected to resign if they
got married
o more women than men graduated from high school – with professions like medicine and
science closed to them, many turned to the new “business schools” that offered training in
stenography, typing, and bookkeeping
 many taught school
o black women had always worked and in far larger number than white women
 black women tended to remain in the labor force after marriage or the start of a family
 had less opportunity for job advancement
o some claimed that women’s employment endangered the home – threatened a woman’s
reproductive functions, and stripped them of “that modest demeanor that lends a charm to
their kind”
 the birthrate continued to drop and the divorce rate soared
o David Graham Phillips – would be assassinated for his opinions on the women’s role
o many children worked
 as public indignation grew, the use of child labor shrank
o Women’s Trade Union League – lobbied the federal Bureau of Labor to investigate the
conditions which women and children were working under
 investigation took four years (1907-1911)
 led to the establishment of the Children’s Bureau – which was formed within the
US Bureau of Labor
o showed the need for greater protection of maternal and infant health
 1921 – Congress passed the Sheppard-Towner Maternity and Infancy Protection Act
 helped fund maternity and pediatric clinics
o provided a precedent for the Social Security Act of 1935
o many middle-class women became involved in the fight for reform
o many showed the ongoing changes in the family, taking increasing pride in homemaking and
motherhood
 Mother’s Day – was formally established in 1913
o birth control became a more acceptable practice
 federal Comstock Law – banned the interstate transport of contraceptive devices and
information
The Niagara Movement and the NAACP
o many African Americans worked on the cotton farms and in the railroad camps, sawmills, and
mines of the South under conditions of peonage
 peons traded their lives and labor for food and shelter
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forced to sign contracts allowing the planter “to use such force as her or his
agents may deem necessary to require me to remain on his farm and perform
good and satisfactory services”
o illiteracy rate among African Americans dropped from 45% in 1900 to 30% in 1910, but
nowhere were they given equal school facilities, teachers’ salaries, or educational materials
o 1905 – socialist W.E.B. Du Bois met near Niagara Falls, New York
 pledged action in the areas of voting, equal access to economic opportunity, integration,
and equality before the law
 rejected Booker T. Washington’s gradualist approach
 Niagara Movement – wanted for African Americans “every single right that belongs to a
freeborn American, political, civil, and social; and until we get these rights we will never
cease to protest”
 focused on equal rights and the education of African American youth
o spawned later civil rights movements
o race riots broke out
 white mobs invaded black neighborhoods – burning, looting, and killing
o reformers called for the conference that organized the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People – became the most important civil rights organization in the
country
 Du Bois – the only African American among the top officers
o joined by the National Urban League, the NAACP pressured employers, labor unions, and the
government on behalf of African Americans
 persuaded the federal government to form a special Bureau of Negro Economics within
the Labor Department to look after the interests of African American wage earners
o despite all this, African Americans continued to experience disenfranchisement, poor job
opportunities, and segregation
“I Hear the Whistle”: Immigrants in the Labor Force
o many immigrants came from southern and eastern Europe
 still called the “new” immigrants – they encountered hostility from the “older”
immigrants of northern European origins who questioned their values, religion,
traditions, and appearance
o labor agents – the padroni – recruited immigrant workers, found them jobs, and deducted a fee
from their wages
o immigrant patterns often departed from traditional stereotypes – moved both to and from
their homelands
 “birds of passage” – returned home every slack season
 World War I would interrupt the practice and many would be trapped
o Henry Ford and other employers tried to erase the differences through English classes and
deliberate “Americanization” programs
 Ford ran a school where immigrant employees were first taught to say “I am a good
American.”
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students would act out a gigantic pantomime where, clad in their old-country
dress, they filed into a large “melting pot” and emerged wearing identical
American-made clothes, with each waving a little American flag
International Harvester Corporation – taught Polish laborers to speak English, but it also taught
lessons on how to behave in the workplace
Women’s Trade Union League (WTUL) – urged workers to ignore business-sponsored English
lessons because they did not teach female workers the “things she really wants to know”
 designed its own educational program “New World Lessons for Old World Peoples”
Mexicans – for the first time immigrated in large numbers, especially after the Mexican
Revolution in 1910 that forced many to flee across the border into Texas, New Mexico, Arizona,
and California
 border crossings were not counted until 1907 – many avoided the official immigration
stations
 most came from the Mexican lower class, eager to escape peonage and violence
 labor agents – coyotes – normally working for a large corporation or working for
ranchers – recruited Mexican workers
 Mexican Americans and their children transformed the Southwest
 built most of the early highways in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona
 dug the irrigation ditches that watered crops throughout the area, laid railroad
track, and picked the cotton and vegetables that clothed and fed millions of
Americans
 lived in shacks and shanties along the railroad tracks, isolated in a separate
Spanish-speaking world
o formed enclaves in the cities – barrios – became cultural islands of family
life, foods, church, and festivals
fewer people immigrated from China in these years
because of anti-Chinese laws and hostility
wanted to make money and return home
willing to work hard for low wages, wanted to preserve clan and family associations from China,
and maintain strong ties with their home villages – Chinese Americans resembled other
immigrant groups
differed in two important aspects:
 1920 – men outnumbered women by ten to one the male median age of 42, their
communities were generally dominated by the elderly
 the number of Chinese Americans shrank
after 1910 – the US government set up a special immigration facility at Angel Island in San
Francisco Bay
 Chinese immigrants were kept for weeks and months, examined and re-examined,
before being allowed to cross the narrow band of water to San Francisco
 facility would remain open until 1940
many Japanese also arrived at Angel Island
 developed communities along the Pacific Coast – settling mainly on farms
o nativist sentiment intensified
 sneered at immigrant dress and language
o racial theories emphasized the superiority of northern Europeans
 new “science” of eugenics suggested the need to control the population growth of
“inferior” peoples
o 1902 – Congress passed a law prohibiting immigration from China
o statues requiring literacy tests were designed to slow immigration from southern and eastern
Europe, but were vetoed by William Howard Taft in 1913 and again by Woodrow Wilson in
1915 and 1917
 1917 – a measure passed despite Wilson’s veto
o other measures tried to limit immigration from Mexico and Japan