Progressive Movement
Progressive Movement
The Progressive Movement tried to fix the problems brought forth by industrialization after the Civil War in America. Although many American’s benefitted from the new change in the country, a good portion of them did not. Some of the issues it attempted to address through the help of muckraker journalists were women and child labor, public education and health, elimination of governmental corruption, product safety, treatment of employees, and sanitation of work areas. Women and child labor had become a growing moral issue amongst the public as it became more noticeable through journalists exploitations because they were willing to work all day for a less amount of money as opposed to male workers. Progressivism led to the enactment of Child Labor Laws which prevented the overworking of children in the industry. This allowed poor children to go to school and the factory owners were not happy with this because they were losing workers.
In 1836, Union Members at the National Trades Union proposed that states establish a minimum age for factory workers. In 1936, The Walsh-Haley Act stated that the U.S. would not purchase goods made by underage children. Finally in 1938, children’s minimum wages of employment and hours of work were being regulated by federal law.
Another huge issue was the sanitation of work areas. In Sinclair’s The Jungle, he gave examples of the American Dream in chapter 2 and discussed the hopes of an immigrant family that had migrated from Lithuania to the U.S. They had moved to Packingtown, Chicago, which was the largest meat producing industry of the country. Originally, most of the people that lived there were German and Irish immigrants that were skilled butchers, but with the increase of immigrants in the U.S., the area soon became a slum full of filth, disease, and poor living conditions.
In order to test the accuracy of the description in The Jungle, President Roosevelt sent out two agents to inspect the
The Progressive Movement tried to fix the problems brought forth by industrialization after the Civil War in America. Although many American’s benefitted from the new change in the country, a good portion of them did not. Some of the issues it attempted to address through the help of muckraker journalists were women and child labor, public education and health, elimination of governmental corruption, product safety, treatment of employees, and sanitation of work areas. Women and child labor had become a growing moral issue amongst the public as it became more noticeable through journalists exploitations because they were willing to work all day for a less amount of money as opposed to male workers. Progressivism led to the enactment of Child Labor Laws which prevented the overworking of children in the industry. This allowed poor children to go to school and the factory owners were not happy with this because they were losing workers.
In 1836, Union Members at the National Trades Union proposed that states establish a minimum age for factory workers. In 1936, The Walsh-Haley Act stated that the U.S. would not purchase goods made by underage children. Finally in 1938, children’s minimum wages of employment and hours of work were being regulated by federal law.
Another huge issue was the sanitation of work areas. In Sinclair’s The Jungle, he gave examples of the American Dream in chapter 2 and discussed the hopes of an immigrant family that had migrated from Lithuania to the U.S. They had moved to Packingtown, Chicago, which was the largest meat producing industry of the country. Originally, most of the people that lived there were German and Irish immigrants that were skilled butchers, but with the increase of immigrants in the U.S., the area soon became a slum full of filth, disease, and poor living conditions.
In order to test the accuracy of the description in The Jungle, President Roosevelt sent out two agents to inspect the