Upton Sinclair And Jacob Riis: Muckrakers Of The Progressive Era

he Progressive Era was when Americans were getting more rights and our country’s economy was changing for the better.There were also people called muckrakers who helped expose the truth about were the poor immigrants of America were living and what the meat making industry was really like. There was also a lot child labor happening which was when children worked in terrible working conditions and didn’t get paid as much as adults did. The senators at the time of the suffrage movement were usually the corrupt business owners of america who would use trusts and monopolies to keep their businesses going. Women were also fighting to have the same amount of rights as men did during this time. The country at this time was also trying to expand democracy

He took pictures of people's homes in the slums to show the poor living conditions people were living in. He put it on the New York newspaper so he could get more people to see what was going on in the slums. Upton sinclair was trying to expose the truth about what the meat making industries working conditions were like for the workers working there. He also found that they were putting in the dead rats in the meat making machines after from laying poison bread to kill them and they would also put the bread in the meat making machine with the dead rats and their meat products. Upton Sinclair then wrote a book about what he saw and called it (The Jungle). When he finished his book he took it to President Teddy Roosevelt so he would know the terrible things that were going on in the meat making industries. That is why these two men were such muckrakers for exposing what the poor class were living in and exposing what was going in your meat products and the working conditions for the workers working

The industry owners got children to work for them because the owners didn’t have to pay them as much money like how they have to pay adult workers a lot more money compared to the children. Weren’t able to go to school like we can today because they had to go to work everyday instead of learning. The child labor problem decreased from the 18.1 in the 1890s to 11.3 in the 1920s. In 1938 congress passed a law called Fair Labor Standards to get rid of child labor in our country. During the Progressive movement our state legislatures were corrupt and only had the rich being able to be chosen to be our state senators not the People. After the Revolution some states still had Property Requirements that prevented poor people from voting. If a voter lacked the independence he needed then the person who controls his livelihood could take his vote from him. In 1840 more than 90% of the american white man were able to vote freely for who they want to vote for. This improved America because people had the right to vote for who they wanted to vote for political