What Was the Progressive Movement in the USA?

The progressive movement is the title given to a quasi-political movement that engulfed the US towards the end of the 19 th century and in the advent of the 20 th century. This movement engendered a philosophy of Progressivism that sought for political reforms in government especially toward the eradication of corruption (Howell, 2011). Historically, many American citizens had emigrated from nations with well-established monarchies. Indeed, the nation itself had risen from 13 colonies of the Britain, and several areas owned by the French Empire. The concept of a powerful government, local and federal being generally supreme was, therefore, well engendered. With the advent of industrialization, there was an influx of wealth created by the individual efforts of the populace with little government support. Further, there also arose an increasingly enlightened middle class. The combination of enlightenment and a sense of ownership over national wealth propelled the populace to seek for a better utilization of taxes, thus creating the progressive movement. 

The first cause of the movement was the fact that the populace had progressed yet the government had remained relatively backwards. The educated people, mainly in urban areas developed the concept of an ideal society, which mutated into the concept of an ideal political system. During that period, there was no universal suffrage thus democracy had not matured in America. The major cause for the progressive movement was, therefore, corruption in government. The American Constitution invested a lot of power on the federal government specifically because it was passed in the background of a rebellion. With the advent of industrialization, the Supreme Court of the USA, in a bid to support inter-state trade exponentially increased the powers of the central government. This created a very powerful nucleus in Washington for what was slowly becoming the most powerful nation on earth (Howell, 2011). With so much power, politicians devised corrupt ways of abusing power, misappropriate funds and control the political will of the people. These became the major causes of the progressive movement. 

There are two major categories of changes that resulted from the progressive movement. These are changes in government and changes in the corporate sector. The movement, which began from a social perspective mutated into a political force on which President Theodore Roosevelt rose to power in 1901 (McGerr, 2010). This gave the movement the capacity to effect actual change in the society. The changes in government included the creation of an actual government system that was answerable to the people and the establishment of women suffrage through the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1920. With regard to the corporate sector, the Federal Reserve System was established in 1913. This established a form of control over the excesses of the corporate sector by creating a form of balance and oversight. The second reform was the establishment of antitrust laws to check the excesses of extreme capitalism in the private sector. 

The gender right organization; National Woman’s Party (NWP) led by a very young Alice Paul deserves special mention as one of the high impact special group association during the progressive era. The fight for women suffrage had been peacefully fought by the National American Woman Suffrage and its predecessors for decades (McGerr, 2010). NWP however, in 1917 when America was focused on the Great War began a violent and combatant approach to the issue of women suffrage. This not only created a major controversy and condemnation, but also a lot of high impact publicity for the universal suffrage cause. After years of peaceful protests by women groups, the violent approach by NWP gave the nation the final nudge that was necessary for the adoption of women suffrage in 1920. 

The upshot of the foregoing is that the increase in education created an increase in enlightenment among the American populace. This was initially focused on social ideologies but was soon transformed into a political movement. The movement began in the local levels but rose to state and finally national levels culminating into the election of President Roosevelt in 1901. Great progress was achieved through the movement, and more would have resulted thereafter had President Woodrow Wilson not intertwined the movement with the push for the Great War. Although the war was won, it was a clear pyrrhic victory. This brought an eventual end to the progressive movement in 1920. 

References 

Howell, J. (2011). The regressives: Unraveling the progressive movement. Journal of the Utah Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters, 88513-88525. 

McGerr, M. (2010). A fierce discontent: The rise and fall of the progressive movement in America. New York: Simon and Schuster