People from a Broad Spectrum of political backgrounds in the progressive era believed were important. They believed they were not incompatible but you can see some ways in which they were fundamentally adding tension. Throughout class today, think about democracy versus efficiency. So the central question for historians of the early 20th century is, what is progressivism . A famous article that came out in 1982 was entitled in search of progressivism which aptly summed up the way historians were rummaging around knowing that this era existed but quivering about what counted as progressivism. When it ended, when it started, who counted in it . Some people limit only to the Political Party it was named for. Others to find it much more broadly. So for me in this class, this is how i will define progressivism. And the broadest sense, it was the way a whole generation of americans defined themselves politically and how they addressed the problems of the new century and what i think we can all agree begins to look like modern america. They are interested in reforming society in new in fundamental ways while trying to keep aspects from the old. Im defining the progressive era as lasting from approximately 1890 through world war one. Before i subjected you all to this lecture today i consulted with my colleague who many of you know is a expert on populism. He teaches this class as well. I asked him what he thought and made sure i got rid of howlers during my lecture. This is what he wrote to me and i think this is worth talking about. The ways we are basically on the same page but argue about the edges. The chronology of the progressive era is always debatable. Beginning in 1890, theres the chairman act which we will discuss today, and the beginning of jane adams rip remarkable settlement house in chicago. In national and state politics there were no people we would consider progressive in power until about 1900. If he says he says if were going to define it that way lets push it up a little bit. If he had won that election in 1896 it would have been different. Of course the chronological scope you favorite depends on what you think mattered most. It is worth noting that many populists became progressives. Some of you already recognized that and we will talk about it more. Spoiler alert, we will talk about how wilsons new freedom plan included many things that the populist party had proposed in the 1890s. But also many of them actually became socialists in places we dont think of as bastion of socialism today such as texas, and oklahoma. What historians do largely agree on is that the high mark of the progressive era was in 1912. The election, the four way election between between taft woodrow wilson. Roosevelt who came out of retirement and rent is the head of the Progressive Party also known as the bull moose party. As well as the fourth major candidate eugene depths, a socialist. He came through the Labor Movement and considered himself a socialist. He pulled 6 of the votes in that 1912 election. Almost 1 million votes. Again, i think everyone across that spectrum would find themselves in some sense is a progressive. So lets put some more fine notes on our definition of progressivism. Progressivism was a commitment to some sort of reform in society. Often using local, state or federal governmental means. I think too often in u. S. History we talk about the federal level of progressivism. It turns into this discussion of wilson versus roosevelt. I want to say its really starting at the grassroots in cities and states and territories and moving upward towards the federal level. It was a form of perfectionism by which i mean the belief that society could be perfected using proper principles. In this sense i think it is a mood as much as a method. There is no one way of doing things. But it is a sort of mood or attitude toward change and reform and society in politics. That is one in which you believe that things can be improved. In that sense, as i will talk about through the rest of lecture, there is some pessimism and worry and concern. But theres also incredible confidence and optimism that society and politics and economics and democracy can be improved and maybe even perfected. And here we have again that tension between democracy and efficiency. Now let us be honest, i wrote the first version of this lecture many years ago. History changes but not that fast. I have to tell you this is the first year that i have actually assigned a portion of Woodrow Wilsons new freedom plan. I could not have invented a document better suited for the teams that i want to stress today. What does he compare liberty to . You are all suddenly shy. Yes . An engine. An engine. A machine right . This is perfect for all you matt, science mechanical people. This is the perfect metaphor. For the way that people think about government and politics in the early 20th century. The machine does not work well with friction right . He wants to reduce the friction. The more efficient the machine is the better. Liberty for the several parts would result in the best possible some bling and adjustment of them all. You can see his optimism, even might i say his ego isnt as a professor. His optimism. Human freedom consists in perfect adjustments of human interests and human activities and human energies because the trouble lies when the machine gets out of order. In other words, he is saying the governments job quite literally is to get under the hood and tinker with the machine to get it running right. Here again we see also from a cultural perspective. I love this documents so much, we get back to machines, technology, railroads, it is not an accident that efficiency is a concept that becomes enormously fascinating to people in the early 20th century. Efficiency in both its industrial and social components. So here are some key words if you need to come back to them in class. I forgot to tell you, of course i did not start with a song because he knew i would screwed up. But we will come back to music on thursday. Before i get into the weeds of what progressivism looks like in this time period. To give you a sense of this incredible wide range of things, efforts, reforms, causes that people thought of as progressive campaigns in the early 20th century. We have Civil Service reform, cleaning up bureaucracy. Conservation movement which i know some of you are particularly interested in. Conservation as a sort of efficiency. Clean milk campaigns. Making sure that children who drink milk, that it is clean and on a adulterated. Women suffrage. Public education, reinvigorated since the reconstruction era particularly at the local level. The expansion of public kindergartens. The establishment of some of the first public high schools. Campaign finance reform. Trying to keep out those corrupt Railroad Owners from politics. Not successful but a worthy effort. Utility regulation, the origin of modern Public Utilities that are either a private corporation that is licensed, to a municipality or state, or ones that are actually publicly owned and operated. Regulation of food and drugs. Many of you took the history on fda. It originates under Theodore Roosevelt. The regulation of railroads which is actually a kind of opening salvo of progressive era. Municipal ownership immune utilities. Prohibition of outline of alcohol. Social work, the modern field of social work then as now dominated by women. Anti prostitution and pornography campaigns in the form of what was called the white slavery movement. Saving women from what we would call today sex trafficking. You can see a strong moral and protective element to this campaign. Legal Birth Control, which was the act of the late 19th century made discussing disseminating any kind of information about Birth Control illegal. Election reform, which i will talk about particularly on the state level in just a few minutes. Okay, maybe i put these sort of making judgments, some of these im seeing is provinces it is because i put them at the bottom, but also course of social control of welfare clients, forced attempt to strip immigrants of their culture in the name of american civilization. Voter disfranchised meant and the name of clean government. Segregation in the south as a sign of efficiency prohibition and later, eugenics. I know i went through that really quickly. That is fine. No worries its fine. I want to say, we are talking about from clean to voter initiatives. From dinner garden to funding higher act, from kindergarten to the first page a really wide variety of things. You can see in the examples ive noted here, again this relationship a little bit between democracy and efficiency. Wilson talks about this in terms of liberty. Liberty works in an efficient capacity. In a random example of clean bill, which was a campaign that many women were companies adulterated milk with chemicals to make it seem like it would last longer and keep it white. It poisons children. Liberty with say we wont interfere with regulations for dairies. Efficiency would say, maybe our society would work better if children did not die from adulterated milk. You can see, that is a one tiny example that actually something that was very important to people in the early 20th century. Why these two obsessions with democracy and efficiency . Could these be compatible . Where does this come from . What i want to talk about is the way in which, and we can go back to the slides here. What i want to talk about is the way that what we talked about as progressivism as the National Movement as suggested, actually bubbles at more from the grassroots even though it comes to be known as this thing that is kind of a government by experts. It is a National Movement built for regional movements. What you have simplified midwestern and northeastern concerns about urbanization, overcrowding, immigration, industrialization. Political machines. Political corruption. You have on the one hand that great mass of demands for change, concerns, the rise of political figures like peter roosevelt. Those meet up with the more agrarian concerns of southern and western populism. Populism, it may not seem so today as much to us now where i think we generalize were all america a few of you are from rural places. The mid western corn, commodity culture was a very different kind of agrarian economy than the souths cotton based sharecroppers vestiges of jim crow. They found enough common cause briefly in populism that did not last. Part of it was about this feeling of the world places being left behind. Some of the political electoral success of the progressive era in the early 20th century was that these midwestern and northeastern urban concerns were able to find in some cases common cause with these folks that had been former populist. Particularly around issues like regulating interstate commerce, the railroads, starting to talk about conservation. In fact, after 1900, populism and progressivism basically merged as professor cases comments suggested. Populists essentially become progressives except for those who say yet more radical and join the socialist party. Intellectually, theyre inspired by social gospel theory. You read an example of it of that today. I dont want to say aggressive, but an assertive campaign by many religious leaders predominantly there were some reformed jews active in this movement as well who said we need to realize that we cannot be just focused on the after life and the spiritual life. We have to think about life here on earth. He talks about what it means to think about jesus is work today and here and now. Thats social gospel theory also informs this pretty aggressive work. Would you will wilson comes from an entire family of ministers. Most of these folks definitely feel a sense of christian mission. This is wedded to the invention of new social science. Disciplines like sociology, political science, economics, history. Their first professional association emerge in this time period. As i mentioned, the first ph. D. Programs and social sciences that are literally creating experts, open at places like johns hopkins, the ivy leagues, schools like the university of wisconsin. Yay. And michigan. University of california. Those giant Public Research institutions alongside the kind of old style where prestige institutions and new upstarts like hopkins and university of chicago which are designed to create these graduate programs like europe has. The idea is that theyre going to produce not just pointy headed professors like me, but experts that are going to go out and solve social problems. Financers. Finally efficient answer. Woodrow wilson has a ph. D. From johns hopkins. He is the president of pressed princeton before he becomes the governor of new jersey and the president of the United States. What is bothering them . Will review this and i think you know what many of these things are. We can talk about a few of the motivations in terms of fears. Fears of new capitalism. As Companies Grow larger and larger and capitalism becomes more and more impersonal, im talking really fast, i will step back and have you think about that. Think about a 19th century world where your neighbor might have chickens in her yard to sell eggs. You know her. Her eggs are not going to be rotten because she does not want to rip you off because you have a face relationship. Or you are a farmer that goes to the local grain elevator. You know that operator. You are not selling at a fixed rate across hundreds of miles on the southern pacific railroad. Where you have to pay a certain rate and you cannot negotiate. You dont know who youre seller is. I think we take for granted global capitalism and personal nation nature, when you will get things from amazon prime. You are not thinking about who is pulling off the warehouse self and putting it in a box and putting the label on and sending it to you, like people were used face to face transaction. This was threatening. It was a real change. And they fear that the outsides power of huge corporations would ruin democracy. The Runaway Railroad industry as i mentioned was just one example. The journalist called muckrakers were revealing devious methods like standard oil, writing along exposes in popular magazines and this reflected both the real changes that are happening in american capitalism as well as the anxieties that those produced in americans. Speaking of anxieties in americans, fear of new americans, that is fear of new immigrants. We will talk about this and much more detail in the coming weeks. The cities are filling with people. Many americans have discomfort about immigration even though many of them are the children of immigrants themselves. New immigrants from southern and Eastern Europe constitute an unprecedented wave of new arrivals from about 1882 to 1920. 18 to 24 million new immigrants come to the United States and this exact same time period we call a progressive era. At its peak, they represent almost 15 of the american population, a figure we have never exceeded. We came very close in 2007 before the recession, but those are sort of parallels. I do not need to tell you what the hot issue is right now. Our numbers are way down from a decade ago. In that sense, from the standpoint of the proportion of the american populations who were immigrants, similar. Different places though. But they are also often feared in the same ways. They are predominantly catholic or eastern orthodox or jewish. They seem unassailable. They are very poor. They tend to congregate and urban places in a country that Still Believes itself to be a rule origin African Americans are starting to move and what will become the great migration. Migrating like ida b. Wells did to the urban south and to the urban north. Close to 2 million African Americans moved from the south to north between 1890s and 1910. Many northern whites are confronted with mixed populations for the first time. The transition of African Americans to urban life is difficult. They are predominantly world people. Not used to city life. Facing obviously segregation in the north as well as the south. Its horrible overcrowded conditions and pitted full Public Health and lack of utilities like safe water or electricity and many residents. There is kind of a chicken egg debate. Among more privileged americans, are these new emit immigrants and African Americans from the south the cause of the poor conditions or are the poor conditions thus producing the inequalities that are evident for all americans to see . This is really kind of the essential question in the progressive era, which eventually, in spite of all the prejudice, i would argue comes to what we could call, and it wont be what you think it is, environmentalism. What i mean by that is the belief that once environment shapes their outcome. If you can improve the environment, you will improve the quality of americans. I dont know why im unclean no today, that would be a perfect example. Urban dwellers who do not have their own cow to milk, to have fresh clean milk from the farm and have to buy milk, they will have Poor Health Outcomes if they do not have good nutritious food. Is the problem the poor city dweller or is the problem the conditions that they are dealing with . Now remember when i talked about how the ideal when we talked about Andrew Carney and rockefeller and the gospel of wealth. We talked about the fact that this recognition of class difference as a fundamental future of American Society was profoundly threatening to many people and many, not coincidentally, middle and upper class folks, rejected the idea that there would be permanent class distinctions in the u. S. One of the things they worried about did they worry about economic inequality, yes. But that they worry about whether a democracy could function with those kinds of entrenched seemingly, irreparable differences. They worried about the state of democracy. With all of these new citizens know how to operate in a democracy . With a b good citizens . Im going to use the example of president Theodore Roosevelt. The month before the 1912 elections so i can clarify for you. He is not currently president. He ascends to the pre