The Progressive Reform Movement

Progressivism: it has one definition, but an abundance of ways to interpret its ideology. In the past, historians like, George Mowry, Joseph Huthmacher, and Maureen Flanagan all looked at the same era of progressivism, but saw different people and different reforms in the progressive reform movement. The defining factors of the movement, the people and the refinement, were up to their interpretations.

Mowry states early on that, contrary to popular belief, “the great majority of the reformers came from the solid middle class” (Mowry 255). Most reformers had also, “gone to college” and “had been conservative” (Mowry 155). The background of a reformer is especially important when considering the reforms they want, particularly with this majority,

As Mowry interpreted, part of the movement “was located in the agrarian West,” but part of the movement was also “rooted largely in the cities east of the Mississippi” (Huthmacher 6). Many reformers were also “of the sturdy Protestant Anglo-Saxon moral” (Huthmacher 8). Huthmacher critiques the middle class reformers strongly writing that, “the cure for social evils lay not only in environmental reforms, but necessitated also a forcible ‘uplifting’ of the lower-class immigrants’ cultural and behavior standards” or, forcing everyone into the same box (Huthmacher 14). Instead, “the urban lower class provided an active, numerically strong, and politically necessary force for reform” Huthmacher 11). Middle class reformers were “determined to uplift the living conditions of their less fortunate brothers” (Huthmacher 9). But, that is obviously how they specifically interpret what progressivism should do. Lower class reformers actually “were of the here and now . . . their outlook tended to be more practical and ‘possibilistic” (Huthmacher 11). In lieu of individualism in the middle class, the lower class held “fears of paternalism and centralization” (Huthmacher 12). They envisioned for themselves a society that did not “look upon political thinkering as the be-all and end-all of

With regards to garbage removal, reduction “fascinates the business man in America because you can extract money out of the garbage” women, however, “wanted to centralize power through the municipal ownership and operation of waste facilities” (Flanagan 202). The focus was, for men, on the individual - how much money can be made?- and for women it was - how do we respond for the good of the people? The Women’s City Club also wanted education reform “in order to educate and prepare [children] for better-paying jobs,” something many would only dream about (Flanagan 204). The City Club also wanted vocational education reform, but were only concerned in reducing the cost of teachers, as they conducted “a rather careful search as to the maximum number of children that can be efficiently taught by a single teacher” (Flanagan 205). Overall, men “became municipal reformers because they had developed a citywide vision” to protect their business (Flanagan 207). Women, on the other hand, wanted “to ‘ensure the moral and social order’ of their surroundings” (Flanagan