History of the United States II / Unit 18 USH2 2555 worked example, 60 to 90 seconds
The Progressive State
The idea
Unit six built the Progressive state. Theodore Roosevelt created a Department of Commerce and Labor with a Bureau of Corporations and brought more than two dozen antitrust suits, entries 0779 and 0781 record, while holding that government was bound to control corporations where the need was shown. Wilson added the Federal Reserve of nineteen thirteen, entry 0788, giving Washington a permanent role in the currency; the Clayton Act and the Federal Trade Commission, entry 0789; and the Adamson Act's federally mandated eight-hour day for railroad workers, entry 0790.
In practice
A bureau investigating corporations, a board over twelve reserve banks, and a commission policing unfair practices.
Where people slip
The confusion to avoid is treating Progressive regulation as hostility to business. Entry 0781 records Roosevelt's distinction between good trusts and bad, and his leaving United States Steel in place; entry 0787 records Wilson's New Freedom preferring competition among small businesses to federal regulation. The Progressive state policed conduct more than it replaced markets.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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