CHAPTER 17 the Progressive Era 1890–1920 1890–1920

p0508-509aspe-0517uo 10/17/02 8:53 AM Page 508 UUNNIITT Modern America Emerges CHAPTER 17 The Progressive Era 1890–1920 1890–1920 CHAPTER 18 America Claims an Empire 1890–1920 CHAPTER 19 The First World War 1914–1920 UNIT PROJECT News Story As you read Unit 5, identify a person, issue, or event that interests you. Plan and write an illustrated news story about the subject you have chosen. Use your text as well as information that you research in the library and on the Internet. The Statue of Liberty by Francis Hopkinson Smith 508 p0508-509aspe-0517uo 10/17/02 8:53 AM Page 509 p0510-511aspe-0517co 10/17/02 8:53 AM Page 510 A 1916 suffrage parade. 1904 Theodore 1901 McKinley is Roosevelt is assassinated; 1896 elected 1900 Theodore Roosevelt president. William McKinley William McKinley becomes president. is elected is reelected. president. USA 1890 WORLD 1890 1900 1889 Eiffel Tower 1898 Marie 1899 Boer War 1901 opens for visitors. Curie discovers in South Africa Commonwealth of radium. begins. Australia is created. 510 CHAPTER 17 p0510-511aspe-0517co 10/17/02 8:53 AM Page 511 INTERACTINTERACT WITH HISTORY It is the dawn of the 20th century, and the reform movement is growing. Moral reformers are trying to ban alcoholic beverages. Political reformers work toward fair government and business practices. Women fight for equal wages and the right to vote. Throughout society, social and economic issues take center stage. What kinds of actions can bring about social change? Examine the Issues • What types of actions might pres- sure big business to change? • How can individuals bring about change in their government? • How might reformers recruit others? RESEARCH LINKS CLASSZONE.COM Visit the Chapter 17 links for more information about The Progressive Era. 1909 W. E. B. Du Bois helps 1908 found the William H. National 1912 Taft is Association for 1916 1919 Eighteenth 1920 Nineteenth Woodrow elected the Advancement Woodrow Amendment Amendment Wilson is president. of Colored Wilson is outlaws alcoholic grants women elected People (NAACP). reelected. beverages. the right to vote. president. 1910 1920 1910 Mexican 1912 China’s 1914 World War I 1919 Mohandas revolution Qin dynasty begins in Europe. Gandhi becomes begins. topples. leader of the independence movement in India. The Progressive Era 511 The Origins of Progressivism MAIN IDEA WHY IT MATTERS NOW Terms & Names Political, economic, and Progressive reforms in areas •progressive •Robert M. social change in late 19th such as labor and voting rights movement La Follette century America led to broad reinforced democratic •Florence Kelley •initiative progressive reforms. principles that continue to exist •prohibition •referendum today. •muckraker •recall •scientific •Seventeenth management Amendment One American's Story Camella Teoli was just 12 years old when she began working in a Lawrence, Massachusetts, textile mill to help support her family. Soon after she started, a machine used for twisting cotton into thread tore off part of her scalp. The young Italian immigrant spent seven months in the hospital and was scarred for life. Three years later, when 20,000 Lawrence mill workers went on strike for higher wages, Camella was selected to testify before a congressional committee investigating labor conditions such as workplace safety and underage workers. When asked why she had gone on strike, Camella answered simply, “Because I didn’t get enough to eat at home.” She explained how she had gone to work before reaching the legal age of 14. A PERSONAL VOICE CAMELLA TEOLI M Mill workers on I used to go to school, and then a man came up to my house and asked my “ strike in 1912 father why I didn’t go to work, so my father says I don’t know whether she is 13 in Lawrence, or 14 years old. So, the man say You give me $4 and I will make the papers come Massachusetts from the old country [Italy] saying [that] you are 14. So, my father gave him the $4, and in one month came the papers that I was 14. I went to work, and about two weeks [later] got hurt in my head.” A CHILD ON —at congressional hearings, March 1912 STRIKE The Testimony of After nine weeks of striking, the mill workers won the sympathy of Camella Teoli, the nation as well as five to ten percent pay raises. Stories like Camella’s Mill Girl set off a national investigation of labor conditions, and reformers across the country organized to address the problems of industrialization. Four Goals of Progressivism At the dawn of the new century, middle-class reformers addressed many of the problems that had contributed to the social upheavals of the 1890s. Journalists and writers exposed the unsafe conditions often faced by factory workers, including 512 CHAPTER 17 women and children. Intellectuals questioned the dominant role of large corporations in American society. Political Y PPLLAAYYEE reformers struggled to make government more responsive KKEEY RR to the people. Together, these reform efforts formed the progressive movement, which aimed to return control of the government to the people, restore economic opportuni- ties, and correct injustices in American life. Even though reformers never completely agreed on the problems or the solutions, each of their progressive efforts shared at least one of the following goals: • protecting social welfare • promoting moral improvement • creating economic reform FLORENCE KELLEY • fostering efficiency 1859–1932 PROTECTING SOCIAL WELFARE Many social welfare The daughter of an antislavery Republican congressman from reformers worked to soften some of the harsh conditions of Pennsylvania, Florence Kelley industrialization. The Social Gospel and settlement house became a social reformer whose movements of the late 1800s, which aimed to help the poor sympathies lay with the power- through community centers, churches, and social services, less, especially working women continued during the Progressive Era and inspired even more and children. During a long career, Kelley pushed the government to reform activities. solve America’s social problems. The Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), for In 1899, Kelley became general example, opened libraries, sponsored classes, and built secretary of the National swimming pools and handball courts. The Salvation Army Consumers’ League, where she fed poor people in soup kitchens, cared for children in nurs- lobbied to improve factory condi- eries, and sent “slum brigades” to instruct poor immigrants tions. “Why,” Kelley pointedly Vocabulary asked while campaigning for a temperance: in middle-class values of hard work and temperance. federal child-labor law, “are seals, refraining from In addition, many women were inspired by the settle- bears, reindeer, fish, wild game in alcohol ment houses to take action. Florence Kelley became an the national parks, buffalo, [and] consumption advocate for improving the lives of women and children. She migratory birds all found suitable was appointed chief inspector of factories for Illinois after she for federal protection, but not children?” had helped to win passage of the Illinois Factory Act in 1893. The act, which prohibited child labor and limited women’s working hours, soon became a model for other states. PROMOTING MORAL IMPROVEMENT Other reformers felt that morality, not the workplace, held the key to improving the lives of poor people. These reformers wanted immigrants and poor city dwellers to uplift themselves by improving their personal behavior. Prohibition, the banning of alcoholic beverages, was one such program. A. Possible Prohibitionist groups feared that alcohol was undermining American morals. Answer Many Founded in Cleveland in 1874, the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union women believed (WCTU) spearheaded the crusade for prohibition. Members this was an area M in which they advanced their cause by entering saloons, singing, pray- In the 1890s, Carry Nation could make a ing, and urging saloonkeepers to stop selling alco- worked for prohibition by difference in hol. As momentum grew, the Union was trans- walking into saloons, society. formed by Frances Willard from a small midwest- scolding the customers, and using her hatchet ern religious group in 1879 to a national organi- MAIN IDEA to destroy bottles zation. Boasting 245,000 members by 1911, the Analyzing of liquor. Motives WCTU became the largest women’s group in A Why did the the nation’s history. A prohibition WCTU members followed Willard’s “do movement appeal everything” slogan and began opening to so many women? kindergartens for immigrants, visiting 513 inmates in prisons and asylums, and working for suffrage. HISTORICAL The WCTU reform activities, like those of the settlement- TLIG house movement, provided women with expanded public SPOTLIGHT roles, which they used to justify giving women voting rights. Sometimes efforts at prohibition led to trouble with ANTI–SALOON LEAGUE immigrant groups. Such was the case with the Anti-Saloon Quietly founded by progressive League, founded in 1895. As members sought to close women in 1895, the Anti-Saloon saloons to cure society’s problems, tension arose between League called itself “the Church them and many immigrants, whose customs often includ- in action against the saloon.” Whereas early temperance ed the consumption of alcohol. Additionally, saloons filled efforts had asked individuals to a number of roles within the immigrant community such as change their ways, the Anti- cashing paychecks and serving meals. Saloon League worked to pass laws to force people to change CREATING ECONOMIC REFORM As moral reformers and to punish those who drank. sought to change individual behavior, a severe economic The Anti-Saloon League panic in 1893 prompted some Americans to question the Background endorsed politicians who opposed capitalist economic system. As a result, some Americans, See capitalism “Demon Rum,” no matter which especially workers, embraced socialism. Labor leader and socialism party they belonged to or where Eugene V.

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