Please Note:
The images included in this presentation, some of which are copyrighted, are being used under the “fair use” provision (for educational purposes)
of the U.S. law governing usage of copyrighted material.
The Progressive Era, 1890-1920
© Edward T. O’Donnell, 2006
• Conflict: Finding and Exploring Conflict and Debate
• Agency: Recognizing How People Shape Their Era
• Choices: History is the study of Choices - Nothing is inevitable!
• Relevance: Make Connections (carefully) to the Present
• Documents and Images
My Approach to Teaching HistoryMy Approach to Teaching History
The Progressive Era
• Defined• Background to the Progressive Era • Three Main Ideas of Progressivism• Who Were the Progressives• Key Progressive Era Reforms • The Darker Side of Progressivism• When Did the Progressive Era End?
The Progressive Era
The period from (roughly) 1890-1920 when many diverse groups in American society launched efforts to reform or eliminate the many social problems resulting from rapid industrialization, urbanization, and immigration.
Defined
total
1880 1,206,2991890 1,515,3011900 3,437,2021910 4,766,8831920 5,620,0481930 6,930,446
Background to the Progressive EraThe “New”
Immigration
Who Came?
• Russian and Eastern European Jews • Italians • Poles • Greeks• Czechs• Bohemians• Irish and Germans (continuing but declining)
• African Americans - The Great Migration
Ethnic Groups in Chicago’s Hull House Neighborhood, 18
Immigrant Cities
1910
% immigrants and their US- born children
New York 78.6%Chicago 77.5%Milwaukee 78.6San Francisco 68.3
Overall, the foreign-born = 14.8% of US population in 1910(12.5% in 2009)
Conflicted Views on Immigration
LOVE IT HATE IT
Many Types
of Nativism
• Disease• Superstition • Poverty• Anarchy • Sabbath
desecration • Intemperance • Crime The Immigrant: The Stranger at Our Gate from The Ram’s Horn April 25, 1896
Source: www.projects.vassar.edu/1896/0425ramshorn.html
• 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act
• 1885 Contract Labor Prohibited
• 1890 Federal Immigration Act
• Ellis Island opens • Four Categories of
Exclusion 1. Health 2. Poverty3. Criminality 4. Radicalism Dumping European Garbage
Judge Magazine, 1890
Toward Immigration RestrictionToward Immigration RestrictionEarly Immigration Restriction
Background to the Progressive Era
Industrialization
1860 1900 % INCREASE
FACTORIES 140,500 510,000 263
VALUE FACTORY PRODUCTION
$1.9 bil $13 billion 584
INDUSTRIAL WORKERS
1.3 mil 5.1 mil 292
PATENTS ISSUED 4,589 95,573 1,983
1860 1900 % INCREASE
OIL 500,000 barrels 45,824,000 barrels
9,065
RAILROADS 30,000 miles 193,000 miles 543STEEL 13,000 tons 10,382,000
tons7,9762
Gross National Product
$7 billion $19 billion 171
Background to the Progressive EraIndustrialization –
Some Stats
Background to the Progressive EraIndustrialization
Background to the Progressive EraUrbanization
1890 1920
New York 1,515,301 5,620,048
Chicago 1,099,850 2,701,705
Background to the Progressive Era
Jim Crow and the New South
Background to the Progressive EraConquest of the West
The Wounded Knee Massacre, 1890
Three Main Ideas of Progressivism
1. Anti-Monopoly (vs. Big Business)
2. The Common Good (vs. Individualism)
3. Government Regulation (vs. Laissez-Faire)
Who Were the Progressives?
1. Women 2. Evangelicals 3. Journalists4. Social Workers 5. Experts 6. Professionals 7. Politicians 8. Conservationists 9. Civil Rights Activists
Key Progressive Era ReformsPolitical Reform
The Problem- corruption
- unresponsive government
Key Progressive Era ReformsPolitical Reform
The Goal- revitalize democracy and increase the influence of the people
- eliminate corruption
Key Progressive Era ReformsPolitical Reform
Municipal Government Reforms
1. City Manager
2. City Commission
3. Civil Service Exams
Key Progressive Era ReformsPolitical Reform
State Government Reform
1. The Initiative
2. The Referendum
3. The Recall
Key Progressive Era ReformsPolitical ReformFederal Government Reform
17th Amendment – the direct election of Senators
Key Progressive Era ReformsEconomic Reform
The Problem
1. Unchecked power of big business
2. Lack of competition
3. Dangerous products
4. Boom and Bust cycles
“The Bosses of the Senate” Puck 1889
“What A Strange Little Government”The Verdict Jan 22 1900 [source: Andrist_The Confident Years]
Key Progressive Era ReformsEconomic Reform
The Limits of Economic Reform
1. Diminish the power of Trusts, but leave most intact
2. Regulate private business, but not control it
3. The Underlying Assumption – capitalism’s benefits outweigh its harmful effects-- the government should minimize the latter
Key Progressive Era ReformsEconomic Reform
Corporate Regulation
1902 Trust Busting
1906 Hepburn Act
1911 Standard Oil Trust broken up
1914 Clayton Anti-Trust Act
Key Progressive Era ReformsEconomic Reform
Consumer Protection
• The Pure Food and Drug Act
• The Meat Inspection Act
Key Progressive Era ReformsEconomic Reform
Banking Regulation
Goal – reduce “Boom and Bust”
1907 Banking Crisis
1911 Pujo Investigation
1913 Federal Reserve Act
Key Progressive Era ReformsEconomic Reform
Greater Tax Equity
No Income Tax- Carnegie’s $25 mil
The 16th Amendment
Growing Economic Disparity 1890
–Top 1% of pop owned 51% of all wealth
–Lower 44% of pop owned 1.2% of all wealth
–Top 12% owned 86% of all wealth –Remaining 88% owned just 14% of
all wealth
Source: Walter Licht, Industrializing America, p 183
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial ReformSocial Reform
The Goal - The Protection and Expansion of Individual Rights
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial ReformSocial Reform
Pro-Labor Legislation
The Problem – few laws or protections for workers
Growing labor unrest
ex: The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire
The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire 1911
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial ReformSocial Reform
Pro-Labor Legislation
1902 Coal Strike
1903 Dept of Commerce and Labor
By 1912 38 states enact child labor laws
By 1912 24 states enact the 8- hour day for public works
By 1917 38 states enact workmen’s compensation laws
Lewis Hine and Child Labor
A moments glimpse of the outer world. Said she was 11 years old. Been working over a year. Rhodes Mfg. Co. Lincolnton, N.C. (Lewis Hine)
Some boys and girls were so small they had to climb up on to the spinning frame to mend broken threads and to put back the empty bobbins. Bibb Mill No. 1. Macon, Ga. (Lewis Hine)
One of the spinners in Whitnel Cotton Mill. She was 51 inches high. Has been in the mill one year. Sometimes works at night. Runs 4 sides - 48 cents a day. When asked how old she was, she hesitated, then said, "I don't remember," then added confidentially, "I'm not old enough to work, but do just the same." Out of 50 employees, there were ten children about her size. Whitnel, N.C. (Lewis Hine)
Breaker boys. Smallest is Angelo Ross. Pittston, Pa. (Lewis Hine)
Adolescent girls from Bibb Mfg. Co. in Macon, Georgia. (Lewis Hine)
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial Reform
Women’s Suffrage
The movement revived in 1893 – NAWSA
State by State effort
Federal Effort
World War I = Opportunity
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial ReformSocial Reform
Women’s Suffrage
1919 Congress passes the 19th Amendment
1920 Ratified
What’s Next?
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial Reform
Anti-Poverty Initiatives
Source: Illustration in Charles Loring Brace, The Dangerous Classes and My Twenty Years Among Them, 1874
Demonizing the Poor
“There is a large class—I was about to say a majority—of the population of New York and Brooklyn … to whom the rearing of two or more children means inevitably a boy for the penitentiary, and a girl for the brothel.”-- A New York City judge, ca. 1885
Traditional Views of the Poor
“The city has become a serious menace to our civilization. . . . It has a peculiar attraction for the immigrant. … Here is heaped the social dynamite; here roughs, gamblers, thieves, robbers, lawless and desperate men of all sorts, congregate; men who are ready on any pretext to raise riots for the purpose of destruction and plunder; here gather foreigners and wage- workers; here skepticism and irreligion abound.”-- Josiah Strong, a prominent Midwestern minister, in his best-selling book, Our Country: Its Possible Future and Its Present Crisis (1885)
As Dangerous Revolutionaries
Traditional Views of the Poor
“What a blessing to let the unreformed drunkard and his children die, and not increase them above all others. … How wise to let those of weak digestion from gluttony die, and the temperate live. What benevolence to let the lawless perish, and the prudent survive.”
— The Christian Advocate (N.Y.), 1879
Traditional Views of the Poor Social Darwinism
Jacob A. Riis sheds new light on poverty and its causes
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial ReformSocial Reform
Street Arabs
Before?
Bandits Roost
After?
How to Read a Historical Image
S scan for important details
I identify the conflict or tension
G guess the creator’s intent or message
H hear the voices
T talk about your observations
S.I.G.H.T. tm © 2008 Edward T. O’Donnell
An Italian Rag-Picker in Jersey Street
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial ReformAnti-Poverty Initiatives – Settlement Houses
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial Reform
Anti-Poverty Initiatives – Tenement Reform
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial Reform
Anti-Poverty Initiatives – Public Education Expansion
Before After
Key Progressive Era ReformsSocial Reform
Anti-Poverty Initiatives – Public Parks in Poor Neighborhoods
Elite Recreation in Central Park in New York
Mulberry Bend, ca. 1890
Anti-Poverty Initiatives –Public Parks in Poor Neighborhoods
Anti-Poverty Initiatives –Public Parks in Poor Neighborhoods
Recreational Facilities
Public Health Cleaning the Streets (finally!)
Before and After
Key Progressive Era ReformsEnvironmental ReformEnvironmental Reform
Conservation
The Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressismThe Eugenics Movement
A.J.N. Tremearne, "A New Head-Measurer", Man 15 (1914):
The Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressism
“The Only Way to Handle It”Providence Evening Journal, 1921
The Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressism
Eugenics and Immigration Restriction
The Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressismThe Lynching Epidemic
183 lynchings a year in the 1890sOr 1 every two days
Thousands gathered in Paris, Texas, for the 1893 lynching of Henry Smith.
The Anti- Lynching CrusadeThe Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressism
Ida B. Wells
“Although lynchings have steadily increased in number and barbarity during the last twenty years, there has been no single effort put forth by the many moral and philanthropic forces of the country to put a stop to this wholesale slaughter.”
-- Ida B. Wells
The Birth of A Nation (1915)
The Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressism
The Dark Side of The Dark Side of ProgressismProgressismImperialism
International Competition and Questions of Security
Progressivism and Imperialism?Progressivism and Imperialism?
1867 Purchase of Alaska1878 Naval Bases Established in Samoa (Pacific)1893 Hawaii annexed1898 Spanish-American War: U.S. acquires Cuba,
Philippines, Samoa, and Guam1899 "Open Door" policy established with China1899-1902 U.S. puts down Philippine insurrection1904 Columbia "Revolution" leads to creation of pro-US
nation of Panama which agrees to allow Panama Canal1909-101912-251926-33
US troops occupy Nicaragua
1914 US intervenes in Mexican Revolution1916-1924 US troops occupy Dominican Republic1915-1934 US troops occupy Haiti
America Becomes an Imperial Power
Progressivism and Imperialism?Progressivism and Imperialism?
The White Man’s Burden, American Style
Progressivism and Imperialism?Progressivism and Imperialism?
Progressivism and Imperialism?Progressivism and Imperialism?Bringing Civilization to the Savages
“Civilization Begins at Home”
Progressivism and Imperialism?Progressivism and Imperialism?
When Did the Progressive Era End?
Teaching American Teaching American History History
“Trying to plan for the future without knowing the past
is like trying to plant cut flowers.”-- Historian Daniel Boorstin
“Who dares to teach must never cease to learn”
-- Librarian and Educator, John Cotton Dana
How to Read a Historical Image
S scan for important details
I identify the conflict or tension
G guess the creator’s intent or message
H hear the voices
T talk about your observations
S.I.G.H.T. tm © 2008 Edward T. O’Donnell
Appealing to the
Feminine Ideal of Purity
Appealing to 1776
Appealing to 1776
Source: SF Call 1909
Denying the Threat to Motherhood and Family
The Question of DemocracyThe Question of DemocracyBelittling and Denouncing the Idea of Women’s Suffrage
The Question of DemocracyThe Question of Democracy