The Women's Suffrage Movement: The Progressivist Movement

The Progressivist movement lasted from 1900 to 1945 and including multiple movements such as the women’s suffrage movement, the birth control movement, and education reform, to name a few. Some of those who left a legacy include Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, John Dewey, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Gary B. Nash, in the textbook The American People: Creating a Nation and a Society, defined progressivism as a “reform movement in the early 20th century centered in the middle class that sought to resolve the problems of industrialization, immigration, and urbanization by using government to help the common people and by promoting order and efficiency” (Nash, G-5). All of these progressivist movements were intended to solve the

Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who were leaders of the National American Women’s Suffrage Movement (NAWSA). Compared to other countries, the United States had fallen behind in giving women the vote. As Anthony and Stanton were getting older, they decided to pass some of their leadership responsibilities in NAWSA to people who were younger than they were. When the younger generation took over, they had three subjects they wanted to address. “The first was that women needed the vote to pass self-protection laws to guard against rapists and unsafe industrial work. The second argument, Addams notion of urban house-keeping, pointed out that political enfranchisement would further women’s role in cleaning up immoral cities and corrupt politics. The third expedient argument reflected urban middle-class reformers’ prejudice against non-Protestant immigrants who voted”(476). Carrie Chapman Catt who was Anthony’s predecessor as the president of the NAWSA, secured the vote for women in 192, achieving the most important

Beginning in 1933 and 1934, the New Deal focused on ideas “relief and recovery” (556) in the United States. In 1936, Alfred Landon challenged Roosevelt’s New Deal, arguing that it could not work. Roosevelt defeated Landon and went to work right away to deliver on the promises he had made. He first reformed the court system, including the Supreme Court. After improving the courts, he improved living conditions for one third of the nation. While it had some faults, the New Deal significantly increased governmental support for lower-class people and improved economic conditions within the country.

The Progressive period, which lasted 1900 to 1945, was a time of vigorous activity. Many new ideas and reforms emerged. There were also many new inventions and discoveries that radically changed manufacturing and industry within the United States. The lives of women, children, and all those who worked in factories changed greatly during this time. Many of the rights and ideas that we take for granted today came to be during this