Choose one of the below prompts. Write a typed, TWO PAGE double-spaced paper and submit it to TurnItIn before 11:00am, July 2nd. These questions may be approached in very different ways and there is no SINGLE way to frame their answers. Draw on your historical understandings of the material this week to consider what YOU think about these questions. Make sure to have a strong argument supported by evidence.
For both question, please do not use any outside sources. You are welcome to use our textbook and the Addams reading. In addition, you MUST use at least one of the following primary sources to support your claims:
-Progressive Party Platform of 1912 ( http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/progressive-platform-of-1912/ )
-Passage of the 19th Amendment Articles from the New York Times (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1920womensvote.html)
-Child Labor in New York City Tenements (http://www.tenant.net/Community/LES/kleeck9.html)
– Roosevelt, “Who is an Progressive?” (http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/who-is-a-progressive/ )
1. This era saw large-scale immigration, corporate consolidation, banking crisis, and a wave of calls for “reform” in American life. Many people today draw parallels between the “progressive era” and our own time. How would YOU evaluate this historical analogy? Make sure to focus on at least THREE diffierent aspects of society.
2. Today, people who call themselves “progressives” tend to consider themselves anti-racist and anti-imperialist. In the so-called “progressive era” between 1900 and 1920, however, many “progressives” endorsed and advanced racial segregation and advocated imperial policies that expanded U.S. control over others in the world. How might you explain the fact that some early 20th century white “progressives” often favored policies rooted in racist and imperialist ideas?