Teddy Roosevelt Recap

• Trustbuster? Wanted to control them, not “bust” them.
• Northern Securities (RR), Standard Oil, American Tobacco trusts were broken up.
• 1902 - TR forced Penn coal mine owners to sit down with union…
• Square Deal - equal opportunity for ALL of us
• Meat Inspection Act
• Pure Food and Drug Act
• Conservation - “conserving” the environment

Other Reforming Presidents

• William Howard Taft
• “Trustbuster?”
• Led to a T.R. comeback…split the Republican party in 1912…with creation of “Bull Moose” Party…so next president would be a Democrat:
• Woodrow Wilson - New Freedom
• Lowered tariffs to increase competition
• Federal Reserve Act - regulated banking
• Federal Trade Commission - investigate unfair business
• Clayton Anti-Trust Act
• PS - 19th Amendment = suffrage for women

Progressive Era & Civil Rights?

• Teddy Roosevelt: Not much action
• William H. Taft: Not much action
• Woodrow Wilson: Not much action
• Heyday for the Jim Crow Era:
• African-American voting decreased
• Segregation expanded
• 1900-1914: 1000 lynchings
• Sparked by propaganda film The Birth of a Nation in 1915, KKK membership peaked at 3-4 million by 1920