Summary: Social Origins Of The Progressive Reform Movement

Monica Luangsrinhotha

Mrs. Aars

AP US History Hour 7

10 March 2017

Social Origins of the Progressive Reform Movement There have been many ideas brought to light about who the progressives were and what their vision on society was. This caused for an increase in disagreements about the progressive reform. The ideas that the three historians had in the readings were quite interesting and they will cause people to rethink who the progressives really were. Joseph Huthmacher presented the idea in Urban Liberalism and the Act of Reform that people of the workforce that demanded for workmen’s compensation and wage laws were behind progressivism. He is able to bring attention to the workforce and create a reasoning for his theory. In Gabriel Kolko’s

He states that reform movements were advocated and influenced by big businesses so that they were able to lower any type of competition and maintain economic and social relations. As stated, “Conservative solutions to the emerging problems of an industrial society… uniformly applied… result was a conservative triumph… there was an effort to preserve the basic social and economic relations essential to a capitalist society, an effort that was frequently concsiously as well as functionally conservative” (Kolko 20). These big businessmen did not control the politicians with a terrible motive, so they worked with the politicians. He also stated that political and business people shared social values and class values, “The business and political elites knew each other, went to the same schools, belonged to the same clubs, married into the same families, and shared the same values” (Kolko 31). Making it possible for politicians and businessmen to work alongside one another. They all generally wanted economic stability and to regulate on federal levels to thwart many radical and random derivatives by the state, “It is business control over politics (and by ‘business’ I mean major economic interests) rather than political regulation of the economy that is the significant phenomenon of the Progressive Era” (Kolko 21). Furthermore, he mentions the main objective of the business controlled

He had more success creating a persuasive argument because he fills in the blanks that Mowry and Huthmacher left in their pieces. Politicians and businessmen had a common goal and created reforms that were influenced by businessmen that were victoriously voted upon by the Congress, “The various presidents evaded a serious consideration of issues until congressional seeking reforms often found a sympathetic response among the members of the House and Senate long before Presidents would listen to them” (Kolko 28). Kolko reinforced his general ideas by stating that Americans presumed progressivism and political capitalism was for public good, “The fetish of government regulation of the economy as a positive social good was one sidetracked a substantial portion of European socialism as well, and was not unique to the American experience” (Kolko 32). His ideas about the goals of businessmen within political capitalism was explained quite thoroughly. Kolko did ignore the idea of social reform, but he was able to bring light to the welfare reforms and labor movements that were enforced within