Lesson 17 essential question How did political, economic, social conditions at the turn of the century provoke Progressive reform?

progressivism Turn and Talk What do you think it means?

Progressivism: a social and political movement of the early 1900s committed to improving conditions in American life In your opinion, what conditions needed to be improved at the turn of the century?

Note to teacher Give an example of a needed change. Do The Jungle excerpts now

The Origins of Progressivism By 1900, industrialization, urbanization, and immigration were causing sweeping changes in American life. These changes introduced new opportunities but also created new problems, especially in cities. In response to these growing concerns, the progressives took action, hoping to improve society by promoting social welfare, protecting the environment, and making government more efficient and democratic. The progressives were optimistic about the future and held strong beliefs in the nation’s founding ideals, which they ultimately wanted to implement. The majority of progressives lived in urban areas and were largely white, middle class, and college educated. Many progressives were also women.

Progressives Challenge Social Darwinism Progressives strongly opposed social Darwinism, the social theory based loosely on Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection. As Darwin hypothesized that only the fittest survive in nature, social Darwinists believed that in human society the fittest individuals— and corporations—would thrive, while others would fall behind. They asserted that the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of business owners and monopolies reflected the natural order.

Progressives rejected social Darwinism Progressives rejected social Darwinism, arguing that domination by the rich and powerful distorted democracy. They declared that most Americans were harmed when monopolies controlled the economy and corrupted politics. Progressives believed that government should actively defend the political and economic rights of average citizens against the power of big business. They also wanted government to promote social reforms to clean up the cities and help those in need.

Were the Progressives political radicals and socialists? Although progressives criticized big business, most were not radicals, and unlike many socialists, they believed in private enterprise. They felt that government should balance the interests of business owners and workers while promoting order and efficiency. They favored helping the needy but also believed that aid should go to those willing to help themselves. Although some radical reformers worked with the progressives, the progressives generally pursued moderate political goals.

Progressives worked on improving urban (city) living conditions. Progressives such as Jane Addams, the cofounder of Hull House, worked to clean up impoverished urban neighborhoods. They sought to improve tenement housing, sanitation systems, and garbage collection.

Progressives fought to improve working conditions. They promoted laws limiting work hours and guaranteeing workers’ compensation. Furthermore, they formed the National Child Labor Committee to campaign against child labor and prompt more children into school.

Progressives worked to end government corruption. Progressives sought to end government corruption at the local level, working to curb the power of political machines and restructure local government. A political machine is an organization consisting of fulltime politicians whose main goal was to retain political power and the money and influence that went with it.

Progressives fought to expand democracy at the state level. Progressives worked to pass electoral reforms, including the secret ballot, direct primary, recall (a process by which voters can remove elected officials from office), initiative (allows citizens to pass laws directly, enough voters must sign an initiative to get it on the ballot), and referendum (this allows voters to approve or reject bills presented by state legislatures).

Progressives worked to promote equal rights. Many progressive women saw themselves as “social housekeepers,” defining their public work as an extension of the work they did at home. If they could clean up their homes, they believed, they could clean up society, too. But without the right to vote, their chances for success were limited. After the Triangle Shirtwaist fire, a journalist asked a New York machine politician why women factory workers had no fire protection. “That’s easy,” he replied. “They ain’t got no votes!”

Women Fight for the Right to Vote Women demanded the right to vote as early as 1848, when a group of 300 women and men convened at Seneca Falls, New York, to discuss women’s rights. At the Seneca Falls Convention, Elizabeth Cady Stanton argued that “the power to make laws was the right through which all other rights could be secured.” Progress toward that goal, however, was painfully slow, and women continued to advocate for suffrage throughout the late 1800s. During this period, leading suffragists united to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association (National American Woman Suffrage Association: a group formed by leading suffragists in the late 1800s to organize the women's suffrage movement) , or NAWSA, appointing Stanton as its first president. This group helped organize the suffrage movement into a powerful political force at both state and national levels.

Women Fight for the Right to Vote The first victories in the struggle for women’s suffrage were won at the state level. By 1898, four western states had granted women the right to vote, and by 1918, women had voting rights in 15 states. As a result, women voters began to influence elections. In Montana, they helped elect Jeannette Rankin to the House of Representatives in 1916, four years before women had the right to vote nationwide. With her election, Rankin became the first woman to serve in Congress.

Progressives worked to promote equal rights. African Americans faced a more difficult battle to obtain their rights. In the early 1900s, 4/5 of African Americans lived in the South, where most struggled to make a living as farmers and were subjected to strict segregation.  Southern blacks were also disenfranchised by literacy tests, poll taxes, and other methods designed to deny them the right to vote.  Nevertheless, many African Americans were inspired by progressive ideals and fought to improve their conditions. One leading proponent of advancement was Booker T. Washington, an African American educator who founded the Tuskegee Institute (Tuskegee Institute: a vocational college for African Americans in Alabama, founded by Booker T. Washington) , a vocational college for African Americans in Alabama. He encouraged blacks to gain respect and status in society by elevating themselves.

NAACP Some progressives confronted racism, and in 1909, one group formed the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People or NAACP.  The NAACP fought through the courts to end segregation and worked to ensure that African American men could exercise their voting rights under the Fifteenth Amendment.

lynching In addition to its legal work, the NAACP also protested lynching and other forms of racist violence. Between 1894 and 1898, about 550 African Americans were lynched.  Among the progressives who spoke out against this violence was Ida B. Wells-Barnett, a cofounder of the NAACP. In 1892, Wells-Barnett protested the lynching of three African American grocers in Memphis, Tennessee. She expressed her outrage in The Memphis Free Speech, a newspaper she co-owned and edited and also urged African Americans to leave Memphis. In response to her protest, a mob ransacked her offices.

How did economics influence lynching??? Based on systematic research, Wells- Barnett concluded that lynching had an economic motive, arguing that whites used lynching “to get rid of Negroes who were acquiring wealth and property.” Despite the efforts of Wells-Barnett and other progressives, the federal government did nothing to enact laws against lynching.