Chapter 21: The Rise of Progressivism

I. The Progressive Impulse

• Belief in Progress --> society capable of improvement & continued growth and advancement = nations destiny
• Direct intervention in social and econ = essential for order and improved society

A. Varieties of Progressivism

• “Antimonopoly” – fear of concentrated power and urge to limit/disperse authority & wealth
• appealed to workers, farmers, and some middle class
• helped empower gov to regulate or break up trusts (state & national)
• Social Cohesion – belief that individuals are not autonomous, part of web of social relationships --> welfare of individual dependent on welfare of whole society
• Concern w/ “victims” of industrialization --> initiatives & reforms attempting to help women, children, industrial workers, immigrants, African Americans (less)
• Faith in Knowledge – possibilities of applying principles of natural & social science to society --> organization & efficiency
• Social order = result of intelligent social organization & rational procedures
• Knowledge = vehicle for equitable humane society
• Modernized gov must play important role in process of stabilizing society
• Need for new enhanced institutions of gov, leaders, experts

B. The Muckrakers

• Muckrakers – crusading journalists directing public attention to social, econ, and political injustices (Theodore Roosevelt --> “raking up muck”)
• At first major targets = trusts & railroads --> dangerously powerful, deeply corrupt
• 1860s Charles Francis Adams Jr uncovered corruption among railroad barons
• Ida Tarbell & Lincoln Steffens
• 1904 published study of Standard Oil trust by Ida Tarbell
• turn of cen --> muckrakers focus on gov (political machines)
• Lincoln Steffens – reporter for McClure’s magazine who exposed machine gov and boss rule
• Tone of studied moral outrage --> aroused sentiment for urban political reform
• The Shame of the Cities
• Muckrakers peak influence1900-1910
• Investigated govs, labor unions, corporations
• Explored problems of child labor, immigrant ghettoes, prostitution, family disorganization
• Denounced waste & destruction of natural resources, subjugation of women, oppression of blacks (on occasion)
• Helped inspire Americans to take action
• Expressed basic progressive impulses
• Opposition to monopoly
• Belief in need for social unity among corruption & injustice
• Efficiency & organization

C. The Social Gospel

• Public outrage at injustice + social responsibility --> reformers committed to social justice
• “Social Gospel”(early 20th cen) – powerful movement w/I American Protestantism concerned w/ redeeming nation’s cities
• Salvation Army = fusion of religion & reform, Christian social welfare org offering material aid & spiritual service to urban poor
• Many ministers, priests and rabbis left traditional parish work to serve in troubled cities
• In His Steps (1898) Charles Sheldon --> most successful novel of era
• Walter Rauschenbusch – Protestant theologian who published influential discourses on possibilities for human salvation through Christian reform
• Message of Darwinism = cooperation to ensure humanitarian evolution
• Father John Ryan
  
• Rerum Novarum (1893 publication of Pope Leo XIII) --> rich were relying on poor almost like slaves
• Worked to expand scope of Catholic welfare organizations
• Social Gospel was never dominant element in movement for urban reform --> dismissed as irrelevant moralization
• Brought progressive movement powerful moral component & commitment