Roosevelt's And Work Toward Limiting Problems During The Gilded Age

The Progressive Era was a time for the United States society to fix the problems of government, living conditions, and trusts that were brought on by the Gilded Age. President Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson stepped up in hopes to correctly fix the evils of society. There are a variety of different plans that were discussed in order to properly satisfy American’s and work towards limiting problems during the Gilded Age such as child labor and assimilation. These two reformers first addressed these issues through working to eliminate bad trust, strengthen unions, improve poor living and working conditions, and control corruption in government. The Federal Government worked towards fixing the issues of prostitution, alcoholism, and gambling.

These were ways in which a company could take over and control the market area. They were able to get cheap labor from the workers of small businesses because they were under a monopoly. Roosevelt saw ways in which some of these trust would be helpful while also seeing the need to outlaw the bad monopolies. However according to Roosevelt, the 120 trust that Taft bust up are the wrong trust and goes against everything progressive. In Washington’s post Cartoon, President Theodore Roosevelt is taking a stand to shut down bad trusts so there can still be competition within companies and work wages are reasonable. We can see that he has clearly already taken down one bear or “bad trust” and will be planning on doing the same to the rest (Doc 1). Before his presidency 80% of businesses were involved in trust. This would be a difficult task for Roosevelt to break up so he passed the Sherman Antitrust Act enforced in his Square Deal, breaking up sixty bad trust while also making them illegal. In Claytons Antitrust Act Wilson wants to correct the Sherman antitrust act by strengthening deficineces and outlawing price discrimination. Labor organizations need to take a stand not allowing for trust to be overpowering in pricing (Doc

This all began with the muckrakers who were journalist trying to expose the horrors of society. Neill-Reynolds Report goes into detail about meat industries exposing the health dangers which goes right alone with, “The Jungle” written by Upton Sinclair to expose the poor working conditions in meat packing plants. This later brought about the Food and Drug Act to directly state ingredients in the food and drug to help with sanitation (Doc 2). The could take away control economically by passing the 17th Amendment in the New Freedom program. In Roosevelt's Speech, the passing of this amendment would place a graduated income tax, making the rich pay more taxes, helping the common people gain more advantages. Stating senators will be elected by the people, making the legislation more just and diverse (Doc 4). Another way in which they could fix the poor living and working conditions was to start organizations. Reformer Jane Addams, The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets states that all workers entering factory life at a young age must have quality conditions for they are only children and administration is forgetting the terrible conditions they are being forced to do. She created the Hull House which was a settlement house to help people be successful. It would assist them with food, shelter, jobs, and