Progressivism
Idealism, Professionalism, and Politics, 1900-1917
So what was it?
• Multi-faceted reform movement, as much a
persuasion as an agenda
• Credentialed professionals, scientific management,
desire for efficiency underlay many Progressive
initiatives.
• Humanitarian Impulses and Political Reforms
were the two major strains of Progressivism.
(These often were intermingled.)
Why Progressivism?
• Awareness of harsh conditions for
workers—muckrakers: Jacob Riis, How the
Other Half Lives
• Old Liberal Republicans
• Socialism
• Quest for efficiency and order
Poor People Fishing for Coal
Political Progressivism
• Local, State, and National Level Reforms
• “The cure for the ills of Democracy is more
Democracy.
• Council-Manager municipal government [City
Managers (credentialed professionals)]
• Initiative, Referendum, Recall
• Direct Election of U. S. Senators; Graduated
Income Tax
Efficiency
• F. W. Taylor, Principles of Scientific
Management
• Robert La Follette—Legislative Reference
Bureau—legal, economic, and scientific
advice to law makers
Humanitarian Reforms
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Professional Social Workers
Child Labor Laws
Problem with “liberty of Contract”
Muller v. Oregon (1908) upheld maximum
hour laws for women
Progressive Era Presidents:
Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson
Roosevelt Presidency
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Prosecuted Northern Securities Trust
1904 Election—Square Deal
Hepburn Act (1906)—ICC to set rates
Pure Food & Drug Act; Meat Inspection Act
(1906)
• Support of Conservation of Public Domain
Taft Presidency
• Not really a progressive
• Angered Progressives when he supported PayneAldrich Tariff (lower rates of house bill replaced
by high rates under Senate Republicans)
• Angered Progressives when he fired Gifford
Pinchot after he reported how the Richard
Ballinger (Interior) had opened up western rivers
to dams.
• Roosevelt broke with Taft and returned from
Africa to run for political office.
1912 Election
• Roosevelt and Progressive “Bull Moose
Party”: “We stand at Armageddon and we
battle for the Lord.”
• Taft—Regular Republicans
• Wilson and Progressive Democrats
• Wilson had 435 electoral votes; TR had 88;
and Taft 8.
Woodrow Wilson
• Self-righteous Presbyterian Sunday School
Teacher
• Ph. D. in Political Science from Johns
Hopkins
• Scientific Racist—Father was a leading ProSlavery minister (Joseph Ruggles Wilson)
Wilson the Progressive
• Underwood-Simmons Tariff (cut rates and
backfilled with income tax)--1913
• Federal Reserve Act—1913
• Federal Trade Commission—1914 (cease & desist
orders against unfair traders)
• Nominated Louis David Brandeis to S. Ct.
• Signed Keating-Owen Child Labor Act—1916
(Struck down in Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918)
Progressive Legacy
• Racist assumptions made disfranchisement seem
progressive
• White, Middle-Class, College Educated biases
(Prohibition was directed against working class,
eastern European, Catholic immigrants)
• But U. S. Entry into WWI, trumped
Progressivism, the way U.S. entry into WWII
would trump the New Deal