Chapter Notes 28-31
Chapter Notes 28-31
Chapter Notes 28-31
By Drew Sherwood
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Progressive Roots:
• Mounting unrest at more and more power in fewer and fewer hands - laissez-faire wasn't
working anymore
• Read handout with all the authors and muckrakers. Know that Theodore Roosevelt didn't dislike
muckrakers, just got mad at their zeal and exaggeration
Political Progressivism:
• Progressivists = middle class - wanted to use state poiwer to curb trusts and restrain socialist
threat by improving quality of life for the common man - both Democrats and Republicans, men
and women, all regions
• Fought for initiative and referendum with state legislatures, limiting campaign budgests, secret
"Australian" ballot, direct election of US senators (17th amendment - 1913), woman suffrage
Progressivism in the Cities and States
• Cities => expert-staffed commissions, city-manager system: effieciency over democracy
• Governer of Wisconisn "Fight Bob" La Follete - militant progressive Republican leader - gave
power to poeple, scheme for regulating public utilities.
TR's Square Deal for Labor
• "Square deal" - control of corporations, consumer protection, and conservvation of natural
resources.
• 1902 miners; strike in PA -demanded 20% pay incrase and 9-hr workdays => copal supplies
dwindled
• TR brought striking reps and mine owners to White House - TR threated to seize mines and
operate them with federal troops - compromise: 10% pay increase, 9-hr workday
• 1903 - Department of Commerce and Labor created by TR and Congress. Bureau of
Corporations probed about interstate commerce - helped break monopolies "trust-busting"
Caring for the Consumer:
• Unsanitary meat - Upton Sinclair's The Jungle - grossed people out
• 1906 Congress passed Meat Inspection Act -meat shipped over state lines was subject to
inspection, pure Food and Drug Act to prevent bastardization and mislabeling of food and
medicines.
The "Roodsevelt Panic" of 1907
• TR reelected in 1904 - said he wouldn't run a 3rd term "power of the king wanes when they
know he'll be dead in 4 years"
• 1907 panic on Wall Street - blamed TR => fiscal reforms, shortage of currency so Congress
passed Aldrich-Vreeland Act of 1908 - authorized national banks to issue emergency currency
back by collateral (=>Federal Reserve Act 1913)
The Rough Rider Thunders Out:
• TR chose William Howard Taft (Secretary of War) - nominated by Republicans
• Democrats nominated twice-beaten Bryan
• Taft won. 3rd party socialists got 400,000 votes for Eugene V. Debs (Pullman strike)
• TR had tamed capitalism, keeping it alive and strengthening it for the future. Conservation
crusade was his most lasting achievment.
Taft: A Round Peg in a Square Hole
• Yale grad, lawyer, judge
• Mild progressive, but loved status quo
Taft the Trustbuster:
• Trust smasher. 90 suits against monopolies in 4 years.
• 1911 broke up Standard Oil Company. Filed suit against US Steel Corp. - pissed Roosevelt off.
The Taft-Roosevelt Rupture:
• 1911 National Progressive Republican League formed - La Follette leading candidate for
Republican nomination, but TR wanted to run a 3rd term so he took over the Progressive banner
• Taft won (because TRites refused to vote) at Republican convention -> TR on fire to lead 3rd
party crusade
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Wilson's 14 Points:
• Read handout w/ 14 points
• Wilson = moral leader of Allied cause
• Stressed self-determination for minority groups
• 14th point foreshadowed League of Nations
Creel Manipulates Minds:
• Committee of Public Information created - headed by George Creel -> Sell America on the war
and the world on Wilsonian war aims
• Propaganda: pep speeches, posters, pamphlets, anti-kaiser movies, songs "Over There"
• Raised expectations too much
Enforcing Loyalty and Stifling Dissent:
• Fear of German spies and hatred of Germans throughout US
• Espionage Act of 1917, Sedition Act of 1918 - antiwar Socialists (Eugene V. Debs) and
Industrial Workers of the World (William D. Haywood) were convicted
• Schenck vs. US - 1919 - Supreme court ruled Espionage and Sedition acts legal - freedom of
speech could be revoked when they posed "clear and present danger"
The Nation's Factories Go to War:
• Wilson had created Council of National Defense in 1915. Launched shipbuilding program.
Army.
• Laissez-faire loving Americans were against federal economic control - even durhing war.
• War Industries Board (Bernard Baruch) created -weak.
Making Plowboys into Doughboys:
• America helped Allies with navy in seas and supplied $10 billion in loans, but they needed
manpower
• Contraversial (and reluctant by Wilson) draft bill went through Congress -> required
registration of all males 18-45 - no buy your way out (although shipbuilders and such were
exempt)
• About 337,000 "slackers" escaped draft. Women were admitted to armed forces. Blacks had
segregated units and usually did grunt work.
Fighting in France:
• Now Communist Russia dropped out - Germans headed from Russia to France.
• About 1 year after Congress declared war, US soldiers "trainees" started coming to France.
• Small US detachments also sent to Belgium, Italy, Russia (Archangel N. Russia and Siberia to
protect from Japs and such)
The Fourteen Points Disarm Germany:
• Germany turned to Wilson in 1918, seeking peace based on 14 points. Kaiser go the boot.
• Germans laid down guns 11/11/1918. Americans rejoiced.
• US had mainly contributed foodstuffs, munitions, credits, oil, and manpower - not battlefield
victories. The prospect of US troops is what demoralized Germans.
Wilson Steps Down from Olympus:
• Wilson had beomce a moral leader of the world
• 1918 Congressional elections put Republican majority in Congress.
• Wilson's decision to go to Paris himself for peace negociations infuriated Republicans.
• The most logical choice to bring with him would be Senator Henry Cabot Lodge - a republican
scholar in politics, but Wilson loathed him, and the feeling was mutual.
An Idealist Battles the Imperialists in Paris:
• Paris Conference = "Big Four" - Wilson, Premier Vittorio Orlando (Italy), Prime Minister David
Lloyd George (Britain), Premier Georges Clemenceau (France)
• Wilson forced through a compromise between naked imperialism and Wilsonian idealism -
victors would recieve conquered territories as 'trustees' of the League of Nations (Syria-
>France) (Iraq->Britain)
• Wilson's brainchild: League of Nations - assembly with seats for all nations. February 1919 Old
World Diplomats agreed to make the League Covenant.
Hammering Out the Treaty:
• Back in US, Republican Senators (Lodge, William Borah, Hiram Johnson) against League of
Nations. Republican majority refused to sign LoN bill until it was perfect -> put US at the
mercy of France.
• French Clemenceau wanted German Rhineland and Saar Valley - Wilson opposed this violation
of self-determination, but compromised: Saar basin would remain under LoN for 15 years, and
then popular vote would determine its fate.
(forced to sign)