The Progressive Era And Its Amendments By Sam Eskey

837 Words4 Pages

The Progressive Era and its Amendments Sam Eskey A multitude of conditions lead to the period known as the progressive era. These conditions consist of rapid industrialization, urbanization, immigration, and political corruption. The rapid industrialization led the way to urbanization, in that new technology improved farming methods and the successful farmers often bought out the less successful farmers land and the less successful farmers were forced to find employment elsewhere. They moved to cities for factory jobs, the cities expanded and much of the land was urbanized to make up for the amount of people coming to cities, a lot of them being immigrants. During this time there was a lack of specific political rules and as a result there …show more content…

This amendment is long but the main part of it is, “The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branches of the State legislatures”. This amendment made it so that senators would be chosen by the people of the state, effectively giving the people power over the government. With this rule in place, it also made corruption issues less severe because when the senators are voted on by the people, it removes the ability for state legislators to be bribed for specific …show more content…

Violence, riots, and domestic abuse are very common as a result of alcohol consumption. People of this time wanted a way to get rid of the negative effects of alcohol and what better way then to ban alcohol altogether? The 18th amendment says, “After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited”. Though the thought behind the amendment was good, people did not want to give up drinking alcohol. To many people, alcohol was a way to wind down and relax after a long day of working in the factories, which were generally very unpleasant in many ways. So people still found ways to drink, such as secret speakeasies and the making of very fast cars that were used to run by the police. As a result of this, the issues in regards to enforcing this amendment, it was eventually overturned by the 21st amendment on December 5,