Eddie Trejo May 7, 2001 Period 2 APUSH Advanced Placement United States History- Final 1. Analyze Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson's contributions to the progressive movement.
The Progressive Era was an age of scientific investigation. The federal government launched massive statistical studies of immigration, women's and children's labor, and working conditions in many industries. Vice commissions studied prostitution, gambling, and other moral ills of American cities. There are three people that stand out as leaders of progressivism. Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson were all presidents that led the nation in the progressive direction. They each contributed to this movement in different ways with different programs.
When Roosevelt became president he began to progress the nation by conserving the nation's public resources. He was not against commercial development, so long as it was regulated and mindful of the public interest. Roosevelt added more than 125 million acres to the national forest reserve and he also introduced the Newland's Reclamation Act, which designated the proceeds from public land sales for irrigation development in arid regions.
English: William Howard Taft, with Governor-Genera...
Official White House portrait of William Howard Ta...
A Punch cartoon, by Leonard Raven-Hill depicting t...Next, Roosevelt tried resolving the Trust Problem. The depression of the 1890s caused many firms to merge. These mergers or "trusts"�, as they were called, greatly increased the degree of business concentration in the economy. Of the 73 largest industrial companies in 1900, 53 had not existed three years earlier. Most of them were heavily watered-that is, the stocks and bonds they issued much exceeded the real value of the properties they controlled. Roosevelt solved this problem. In 1903, despite considerable opposition, Congress accepted Roosevelt's proposal for a Bureau of Corporations within the newly created Department of Commerce and Labor. Empowered to investigator business practices, the bureau provided the factual record on which the Justice Department could mount antitrust suits. The...