2. Exposing the corruption of early 20th Century America.
MUCKRAKERS
Exposing the corruption of early 20th Century America.

3. Rapid industrialization following the Civil War led to many problems.

4. I. Muckraking
Muckraking: journalistic investigations and published reports involving a host of social, economic and political problems, with the intent of eliciting a popular response to those problems.
Newspapers and magazines began to publish reports.
McClure’s (the most famous “muckraking magazine”)
Novelists and photographers published exposés and disturbing photos.
Upton Sinclair, The Jungle
Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives

5. McClure’s Magazine Founded in 1893 by Samuel McClure
Began specializing in muckraking journalism in 1902
Journalists included:
Ida Tarbell (Standard Oil)
Lincoln Steffens (municipal corruption)

6. Ida Tarbell vs. Standard Oil

7. By 1890 Standard Oil controlled over 90% of the refined oil flows in the United States.
Standard Oil achieved its monopoly through aggressive and often illegal business practices:
Purchasing competitors
Undercutting prices
Shady deals with the railroads
Oil could not leave the oil field unless Standard Oil agreed to move it.

8. From 1902-1904 Ida Tarbell investigated Standard Oil
Her articles raised public awareness of Rockefeller’s ruthless monopoly.
Tarbell’s efforts led to the eventual breakup of the Standard Oil monopoly in 1911.

9. Lincoln Steffens Born, San Francisco 1866
The son of a wealthy businessman
editor of McClure’s Magazine
Published books and articles focusing on municipal corruption
Became a radical communist later in life

10. The Shame of the Cities

11. Machine Politics in the early 1900’s
By 1900 every major American city was controlled by a single political party.
These parties be they Democrat or Republican controlled cities through various underhanded and illegal tactics such as:
Physical intimidation
Bribery
Voting fraud
Ballot stuffing

12. Machine Politics in the early 1900’s Continued…
Once in power these machines were interested only in maintaining their power
They appointed cronies and criminals to important positions
As a result the cities were poorly run, corrupt, and many people suffered.

13. Lincoln Steffens
Through his articles and books, such as The Shame of the Cities and The Struggle for Self-Government; Steffens exposed corrupt political machines in St. Louis, Chicago, Philadelphia, and New York.
Steffens also spoke out about the exclusion of African American voters in the south
Steffen’s work paved the way for the break-up of these political machines as well as important municipal legislation.

14. Lincoln Steffens Helped to popularize… The Initiative The Referendum
The Recall

15. Upton Sinclair Born in Baltimore 1878 Began writing at 15
Became an active socialist in the 1900’s
Wrote a “novel” about immigrants working the Chicago stockyards in 1905… The Jungle

16. The Jungle
There would be meat stored in great piles in rooms; and the water from leaky roofs would drip over it, and thousands of rats would race about on it. It was too dark in these storage places to see well, but a man could run his hand over these piles of meat and sweep off handfuls of the dried dung of rats. These rats were nuisances, and the packers would put poisoned bread out for them; they would die, and then rats, bread, and meat would go into the hoppers together.

17. The Jungle continued
This is no fairy story and no joke; the meat would be shoveled into carts, and the man who did the shoveling would not trouble to lift out a rat even when he saw one – there were things that went into the sausage in comparison with which a poisoned rat was a tidbit.

18. Impact of The Jungle
President Theodore Roosevelt read the book and was horrified.

19. Impact of The Jungle continued
As a result of Sinclair’s book and the President’s reaction, Congress passed both the Pure Food and Drugs Act and the Meat Inspection Act in 1906.