-
John Dewey
He was a philosopher who believed in "learning by doing" which formed the foundation of progressive education. He believed that the teachers' goal should be "education for life and that the workbench is just as important as the blackboard." -
Ida B. Wells
Ida wrote 2 autobiographies before her death, "The Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells and The Memphis Diary of Ida B. Wells: An Intimate Portrait of the Activist as a Young Woman" which her daughter later published and edited -
Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU)
Founded in 1874, this organization advocated for the prohibition of alcohol, using women's supposedly greater purity and morality as a rallying point. Advocates of prohibition in the United States found common cause with activists elsewhere, especially in Britain, and in the 1880s they founded the World Women's Christian Temperance Union, which sent missionaries around the world to spread the gospel of temperance. -
Interstate Commerce Act
The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 is a United States federal law that was designed to regulate the railroad industry, particularly its monopolistic practices. The Act required that railroad rates be "reasonable and just," but did not empower the government to fix specific rates. -
Sherman Antitrust Act
DEFINITION of 'Sherman Antitrust Act' Anti-monopoly U.S. legislation which attempted to increase economic competitiveness. The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 made it illegal for companies to seek a monopoly on a product or service, or form cartels. -
National American Woman Suffrage Association
Formed by the merger of the "liberal" National Woman's Suffrage Association and the "conservative" American Woman's Suffrage Association in 1890. Main goal was to win woman's suffrage. -
How the Other Half Lives
How the Other Half Lives: Studies among the Tenements of New York (1890) is an early publication of photojournalism by Jacob Riis, documenting squalid living conditions in New York City slums in the 1880s. -
Anti-Saloon League
Organization founded in 1893 that increased public awareness of the social effects of alcohol on society; supported politicians who favored prohibition and promoted statewide referendums in Western and Southern states to ban alcohol. -
Eugene V. Debs
Led Pullman Strike which was a 1894 strike against a rail car company after wages were depleted by 1/3 but company town rent was not correspondingly lowered. Strike led by Eugene V. Debs, leader of American Railway Union. Cars were overturned from Chicago to the Pacific Coast, halting rail traffic. Federal troops were brought in on the excuse that the workers were interfering with transit of mail. -
Margaret Sanger
American leader of the movement to legalize birth control during the early 1900's. As a nurse in the poor sections of New York City, she had seen the suffering caused by unwanted pregnancy. Founded the first birth control clinic in the U.S. and the American Birth Control League, which later became Planned Parenthood. -
Square Deal Policy
Economic policy by Roosevelt that favored fair relationships between companies and workers -
Robert La Follette
Progressive Wisconsin governor who attacked machine politics and pressured the state legislature to require each party to hold a direct primary. Nicknamed Mr. Progressive! -
Anthracite Coal Strike
The 1902 strike in which Theodore Roosevelt summoned both sides to the White House and, after threats of seizure and use of troops, reached a compromise of a 10% pay increase and a nine-hour day -
Lincoln Steffens
New York reporter who launched a series of articles in McClure's titled "The Shame of the Cities" in 1902; unmasked the corrupt alliance between big business and municipal government -
Northern Securities Antitrust
Northern Securities Co. v. United States, 193 U.S. 197, was a case heard by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1903. The Court ruled 5 to 4 against the stockholders of the Great Northern and Northern Pacific railroad companies, who had essentially formed a monopoly, and to dissolve the Northern Securities Company -
Elkins Act
The Elkins Act is a 1903 United States federal law that amended the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The Act authorized the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to impose heavy fines on railroads that offered rebates, and upon the shippers that accepted these rebates. -
Department of Commerce and Labor
The United States Department of Commerce and Labor was a short-lived Cabinet department of the United States government, which was concerned with controlling the excesses of big business. It was created on February 14, 1903, during the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt -
Ida Tarbell
A leading muckraker and magazine editor, she exposed the corruption of the oil industry with her 1904 work A History of Standard Oil. -
The Jungle
The Jungle is a novel written in 1904 by the American journalist and novelist Upton Sinclair. Sinclair wrote the novel to portray the harsh conditions and exploited lives of immigrants in the United States in Chicago and similar industrialized cities -
Pure Food and Drug Act
(TR) 1906 , 1906 - Forbade the manufacture or sale of mislabeled or adulterated food or drugs, it gave the government broad powers to ensure the safety and efficacy of drugs in order to abolish the "patent" drug trade. Still in existence as the FDA. -
Meat Inspection Act
The Federal Meat Inspection Act of 1906 (FMIA) is an American law that makes it a crime to adulterate or misbrand meat and meat products being sold as food, and ensures that meat and meat products are slaughtered and processed under sanitary conditions. -
Triangle Shirtwaist Fire
The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York City on March 25, 1911 was the deadliest industrial disaster in the history of the city, and one of the deadliest in U.S. history. -
Progressive (Bull Moose) Party
Bull Moose Party, formally Progressive Party, U.S. dissident political faction that nominated former president Theodore Roosevelt as its candidate in the presidential election of 1912; the formal name and general objectives of the party were revived 12 years later. -
17th Amendment
Passed in 1913, this amendment to the Constitution calls for the direct election of senators by the voters instead of their election by state legislatures. -
Underwood Tariff
Congressional measure to provide the a substantial reduction of rates, and the first ever implementation of a graduated income tax on incomes $3000+ -
Federal Reserve Act
created 12 district banks that would lend $ at discount rates (could increase/decrease amt. of $ in circulation); loosen/tighten credit with nation's needs; first central banking system since 1836 -
Clayton Antitrust Act
28th president of the United States, known for World War I leadership, created Federal Reserve, Federal Trade Commission, Clayton Antitrust Act, progressive income tax, lower tariffs, women's suffrage (reluctantly), Treaty of Versailles, sought 14 points post-war plan, League of Nations (but failed to win U.S. ratification), won Nobel Peace Prize -
Federal Trade Commission
investigated companies and issued cease-and-desist orders against unfair trade practices; could be appealed in court, but still a step toward consumer protection -
Keating-Owen Child Labor Act
The Keating-Owen Child Labor Act of 1916 also known as Wick's Bill, was a short-lived statute enacted by the U.S. Congress which sought to address child labor by prohibiting the sale in interstate commerce of goods produced by factories that employed children under fourteen, mines that employed children younger ... -
18th Amendment
This banned the sale, manufacture and transportation of alcohol -
19th Amendment
Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (1920) extended the right to vote to women in federal or state elections.
