Term | Definition |
Progressivism | Political movement that crossed party lines which believed that industrialism and urbanization had created many social problems and that government should take more active role in dealing with these problems. |
Muckraker | Journalist who uncovers abuses and corruption in a society. |
Lewis Hine | American sociologist and photographer. Hine used his camera as a tool for social reform. His photographs were instrumental in changing the child labor laws in the United States. |
Florence Kelly | American social and political reformer. Her work against sweatshops and for the minimum wage, eight-hour workdays, and children's rights is widely regarded today. |
Nineteenth Amendendment | prohibits any US Citizen from being denied their right to vote on the basis of their sex. |
Maragaret Sanger | American birth control activist, sex educator, and nurse. Sanger popularized the term birth control, opened the first birth control clinic in the United States. |
Mann Act | (White-Slave Traffic Act)Originally meant for immoral acts such as prostitution but ended up being used to criminalize forms of consensual behavior. |
Commissioner plan | Plan in which a city's government is divided into different departments with different functions, each placed under the control of a commissioner. |
City-manager plan | a scheme of government that assigns responsibility for municipal administration to a nonpartisan manager chosen by the city council because of his or her administrative expertise. |
Initiative | the right of citizens to place a measure or issue before the voters or the legislature for approval. |
Referendum | the practice of letting voters accept or reject measures proposed by the legislature. |
Recall | the right that enables voters to remove unsatisfactory elected officials from office. |
Australian Ballot | (Secret ballot) the system of voting in which voters mark their choices in privacy on uniform ballots printed and distributed by the government. |
Eighteenth Amendment | proclaimed the production, sale, or transport of alchohol illegal. |
Booker T. Washington | African-American educator, author, orator, and advisor to presidents of the United States. |
Theodore Roosevelt | 26th President of the US, nicknamed "Trust Buster" & "Teddy", came into office when President McKinley was assassinated. |
Square Deal | Theodore Roosevelt's promise of fair and equal treatment for all. |
Hepburn Act | law that gave the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) the power to set maximum railroad rates and extend its jurisdiction. |
Upton Sinclair | American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle. |
The Jungle | Muckraking novel written by Upton Sinclair that portrays the lives of immigrants in the US. |
Pure Food and Drug Act | act that prevented the manufacture, sale, or transportation of adulterated or misbranded or poisonous or deleterious foods, drugs, medicines, and liquors, and for regulating traffic therein, and other purposes. |
Meat Inspection Act | act that works to prevent adulterated or misbranded meat and meat products from being sold as food and to ensure that meat and meat products are slaughtered and processed under sanitary conditions. |
Newlands Reclamation Act | law that funded irrigation projects for the arid lands of 20 states in the American West. |
Progressive Party | a former political party in the United States; founded by Theodore Roosevelt during the presidential campaign of 1912; its emblem was a picture of a bull moose |
Underwood Tariff | -reduced tariffs and introduced income tax.
-charged American manufacturers who wanted to sell their goods overseas.
-required banks to keep a certain level of assets on hand to meet customer demand. |
Woodrow Wilson | 28th President of the US, leader of the Progressive party, President of Princeton University, Governor of NJ; later when the Republican party broke up, he became President as a Democrat. |
Sherman Anti-Trust Act | prohibits certain business activities that federal government regulators deem to be anticompetitive, and requires the federal government to investigate and pursue trusts, companies, and organizations suspected of being in violation. |
Clayton Anti-Trust Act | enacted in the United States to add further substance to the U.S. antitrust law regime by seeking to prevent competitive practices in their incipiency. |
Federal Reserve Act | Act of Congress that created and set up the Federal Reserve System, the central banking system of the United States of America, and granted it the legal authority to issue Federal Reserve Notes and Federal Reserve Bank Notes as legal tender. |
Federal Trade Comission | established the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), a bipartisan body of five members appointed by the president of the United States for seven-year terms. |
Sixteenth Amendment | allows the Congress to levy an income tax without apportioning it among the states or basing it on the United States Census. |
Seventeenth Amendment | established direct election of United States Senators by popular vote. |
Payne-Aldrich Tariff | a bill lowering certain tariffs on goods entering the United States.[ |