Notes from Rabourn about Progressivism

I took these notes in Ms. Rabourn's American Studies class B4. I took notes on most of the ideas of progressivism, although they are kind of short.

• The ideas of progressivism wanted to make democracy better so that there would be no need for socialism and other governments at that time
  
• They included African American rights
  
• Women's suffrage, or the right to vote
  
• They also fought against monopolies and tried to improve worker's rights
  
• They wanted to have the federal government as a tool for human welfare
  
• The liberals were progressive, and conservative is no change
  
• Muckrakers just showed problems in the society but just pointed out problems
  
• People started investigating problems in their society, and was called Investigative Reporting
  
• Jacob Riis wrote an article "How the Other Half Lives" about the New York slums
  
• Lincoln Steffins wrote a series "Shame of Cities" that investigated corruption in cities and political machines
  
• Ida Tarbell investigated the practices of Standard Oil, and her father owned a competing oil company that was shut down due to competitive practices
  
• The muckrakers needed to check their facts because they could lose their reputations if one thing was wrong and corporations could sue them with their lawyers
  
• Upton Sinclair wrote the Jungle which sympathized with immigrants and slums, and brought the ideas of Pure food and the creation of the FDA. His book Jungle was about the meat packing industry and how bad the conditions were with rats scurrying over the meat and getting grinded with it along with their poison.
  

Some reforms that were made during the progressive era

• The made votes secret to cut the power of political machines so that they don't know if the voters voted for them or not and they can't force them anymore.
  
• They made it allowed for citizens to propose laws
  
• Referendum for citizens to vote on issues
  
• They made a recall for bad politicians
  
• They controlled campaign financing
  
• 17th amendment made it so that it is the direct election of senators
  
• The progressive era did well on the state and city