Progressive MovementCLICK
Excerpt
Progressive tax
No man should receive a dollar unless that dollar has been fairly earned. Every dollar received should represent a dollar's worth of service rendered – not gambling in stocks, but service rendered. The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means.
Therefore, I believe in a graduated income tax on big fortunes, and in another tax which is far more easily collected and far more effective – a graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against evasion and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the estate. – Theodore Roosevelt, speech at Osawatomie, Kansas, "The New Nationalism" (August 31, 1910)
Practical equality of opportunity for all citizens, when we achieve it, will have two great results.
First, every man will have a fair chance to make of himself all that in him lies; to reach the highest point to which his capacities, unassisted by special privilege of his own and unhampered by the special privilege of others, can carry him, and to get for himself and his family substantially what he has earned.
Second, equality of opportunity means that the commonwealth will get from every citizen the highest service of which he is capable.
No man who carries the burden of the special privileges of another can give to the commonwealth that service to which it is fairly entitled. – Theodore Roosevelt, speech at Osawatomie, Kansas, "The New Nationalism" (August 31, 1910)
In every wise struggle for human betterment one of the main objects, and often the only object, has been to achieve in large measure equality of opportunity. In the struggle for this great end, nations rise from barbarism to civilization, and through it people press forward from one stage of enlightenment to the next.
One of the chief factors in progress is the destruction of special privilege. The essence of any struggle for healthy liberty has always been, and must always be, to take from some one man or class of men the right to enjoy power, or wealth, or position, or immunity, which has not been earned by service to his or their fellows. That is what you fought for in the Civil War, and that is what we strive for now. – Theodore Roosevelt, speech at Osawatomie, Kansas, "The New Nationalism" (August 31, 1910)
It is essential that there should be organization of labor. This is an era of organization. Capital organizes and therefore labor must organize. – Theodore Roosevelt, speech at Milwaukee, Wisconsin (October 14, 1912)
It is no limitation upon property rights or freedom of contract to require that when men receive from government the privilege of doing business under corporate form ... they shall do so under absolutely truthful representations ...
Great corporations exist only because they were created and safeguarded by our institutions; and it is therefore our right and duty to see that they work in harmony with these institutions.
– Theodore Roosevelt, December 3, 1901, State of the Union message to Congress, quoted in Roosevelt's biography Theodore Rex by Edmund Morris (2001)
No man can be a good citizen unless he has a wage more than sufficient to cover the bare cost of living, and hours of labor short enough so that after his day's work is done he will have time and energy to bear his share in the management of the community, to help in carrying the general load.
We keep countless men from being good citizens by the conditions of life with which we surround them.
We need comprehensive workmen's compensation acts, both State and national laws to regulate child labor and work for women, and, especially, we need in our common schools not merely education in booklearning, but also practical training for daily life and work. We need to enforce better sanitary conditions for our workers and to extend the use of safety appliances for our workers in industry and commerce, both within and between the States. – Theodore Roosevelt, speech at Osawatomie, Kansas, "The New Nationalism" (August 31, 1910)
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Progressive MovementCLICK
Name Position State Dates held office
James W. Bryan
United States Congressman
Washington
1913-15
Walter M. Chandler
United States Congressman
New York
1913-19
Ira Clifton Copley
United States Congressman
Illinois
1915-17 as a Progressive
John Elston
United States Congressman
California
1915-17 as a Progressive, 1917-1921 as a Republican
John Morton Eshleman
Lieutenant Governor of California
California
1915-17
Jacob Falconer
United States Congressman
Washington
1913-15
William Henry Hinebaugh
United States Congressman
Illinois
1913-15
Willis J. Hulings
United States Congressman
Pennsylvania
1913-15
Hiram Warren Johnson
Governor
California
1911-1917
Melville Clyde Kelly
United States Congressman
Pennsylvania
1917-19 as a Progressive, 1919-1935 as a Republican
William MacDonald
United States Congressman
Michigan
1913-15
Whitmell Martin
United States Congressman
Louisiana
1915-19 as a Progressive, 1919-1929 as a Democrat
Miles Poindexter
United States Senator
Washington
1913-15
William Stephens
United States Congressman
California
1913-17
Henry Wilson Temple
United States Congressman
Pennsylvania
1913-15
Roy Woodruff
United States Congressman
Michigan
1913-15
Homer D. Call
New York State Treasurer
New York
1914
Louis Will
Syracuse city mayor New York
1914-16
More importantly Progressivism in its zeal for top down social reform were strong supporters of Prohibition. Women at that time considered the Temperance Movement more important than suffrage.
The Ku Klux Klan was a BIG supporter of Women's Suffrage, or voting rights for women.
There are some notable exceptions. Churchill stayed sane to the end, as far as I remember.
Very good post. Interesting/educational. Thanks.