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sufferage
the right to vote in public, political elections (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). The right to run for office is sometimes called candidate eligibility, and the combination of both rights is sometimes called full suffrage. -
third party polititcs
a term used in the United States for American political parties other than the Republican and Democratic parties. -
Urbanization
Over the last two centuries, the United States of America has been transformed from a predominantly rural, agricultural nation into an urbanized, industrial one. This was largely due to the Industrial Revolution in the United States in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and the rapid industrialization which the United States experienced as a result. In 1790, only about one out of every twenty Americans (on average) lived in urban areas. -
industrialization
the period of social and economic change that transforms a human group from an agrarian society into an industrial society, involving the extensive reorganization of an economy for the purpose of manufacturing. -
indian removal
a policy of the United States government in the 19th century whereby Native Americans were forcibly removed from their ancestral homelands in the eastern United States to lands west of the Mississippi River, thereafter known as Indian Territory. -
Manifest Destiny
The belief that the U.S. had a divine mission to extend its power and civilization across the whole of North America -
immigration
the international movement of individuals who are not natives or do not possess citizenship in order to settle, reside, study or to take-up employment in the United States. It has been a major source of population growth and cultural change throughout much of the history of the United States. In 1850, 2,244,602 people had immigrated to America. -
Susan B. Anthony
A woman who was a huge supporter of the woman's movement. she attended a anti-slavery assembly and was involved in the temperance movement. -
homestead act
gave an applicant ownership of land, typically called a "homestead," at no cost. In all, more than 270 million acres of public land, or nearly 10% of the total area of the U.S., was given away free to 1.6 million homesteaders; most of the homesteads were west of the Mississippi River. -
the gilded age
The term for this period came into use in the 1920s and 1930s and was derived from writer Mark Twain's 1873 novel The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today, which satirized an era of serious social problems masked by a thin gold gilding. The early half of the Gilded Age roughly coincided with the middle portion of the Victorian era in Britain and the Belle Époque in France. -
progressivism
the support for or advocacy of social reform. As a philosophy, it is based on the Idea of Progress, which asserts that advancements in science, technology, economic development, and social organization are vital to the improvement of the human condition. -
nativism
the political policy of promoting the interests of native inhabitants against those of immigrants. However, this is currently more commonly described as an anti-immigrant position. -
Eugene V. Debbs
He entered politics as a Democratic City Clerk in 1879, and in 1885 he was elected to the Indiana State Assembly with broad support from Terre Haute’s workers and businessmen. Debs was sentenced to 10 years in prison for his opposition to the United States’ involvement in World War I. -
Haymarket Riot
the aftermath of a bombing that took place at a labor demonstration on Tuesday May 4, 1886, at Haymarket Square in Chicago. It began as a peaceful rally in support of workers striking for an eight-hour day and in reaction to the killing of several workers the previous day by the police. An unknown person threw a dynamite bomb at police as they acted to disperse the public meeting. -
dawes act
adopted by Congress in 1887, authorized the President of the United States to survey American Indian tribal land and divide it into allotments for individual Indians. Those who accepted allotments and lived separately from the tribe would be granted United States citizenship. The Dawes Act was amended in 1891, in 1898 by the Curtis Act, and again in 1906 by the Burke Act.1 -
Andrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-American industrialist. Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century and is often identified as one of the richest people ever. By 1889 he owned Carnegie Steel Corporation, the largest of its kind in the world. -
muckraker
used in the Progressive Era to characterize reform-minded American journalists who attacked established institutions and leaders as corrupt. They typically had large audiences in some popular magazines. -
Initiative & Referendum
the process of initiatives and referendums allow citizens of many U.S. states to place new legislation on a popular ballot, or to place legislation that has recently been passed by a legislature on a ballot for a popular vote. Initiatives and referendums, along with recall elections and popular primary elections, are signature reforms of the Progressive Era; and they are written into several state constitutions, particularly in the West. -
Populism
a mode of political communication that is based on contrasts between the "common man" or "the people" and a real or imagined group of "privileged elites", traditionally scapegoating or making a folk devil of the latter. -
Ida B.Wells
Wells first began protesting the treatment of black southerners and she became one of the nation’s most vocal anti-lynching activists. In 1892, she published a pamphlet, “Southern Horrors,” which detailed her findings about lynching. -
Clarence Darrow
he was an American lawyer, a leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, and a prominent advocate for Georgist economic reform. he defended Eugene V. Debs, arrested on a federal charge arising from the Pullman Strike. -
Klondike Gold Rush
a migration by an estimated 100,000 prospectors to the Klondike region of the Yukon in north-western Canada between 1896 and 1899. Gold was discovered there by local miners on August 16, 1896, and, when news reached Seattle and San Francisco the following year, it triggered a stampede of prospectors. -
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. was an American statesman, author, explorer, soldier, and naturalist, who served as the 26th President of the United States from 1901 to 1909. -
Dollar Diplomacy
a form of American foreign policy to further its aims in Latin America and East Asia through use of its economic power by guaranteeing loans made to foreign countries. Historian Thomas A. Bailey argues that dollar diplomacy was nothing new, as the use of diplomacy to promote commercial interest dates from the early years of the Republic. -
Upton Sinclair
Upton Sinclair was an activist writer whose works, including 'The Jungle' and 'Boston,' often uncovered social injustices. -
Pure Food and Drug Act
Pure Food and Drug Act is the first of a series of significant consumer protection laws enacted by Congress in the 20th century and led to the creation of the Food and Drug Administration. Its main purpose was to ban foreign and interstate traffic in adulterated or mislabeled food and drug products, and it directed the U.S. Bureau of Chemistry to inspect products and refer offenders to prosecutors. -
16th Amendment
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration. -
Federal Reserve Act
an Act of Congress that created and established the Federal Reserve System, the central banking system of the United States, and which created the authority to issue Federal Reserve Notes (now commonly known as the U.S. Dollar) and Federal Reserve Bank Notes as legal tender. The Act was signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson -
17th Amendment
The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures. -
19th Amendment
prohibits the states and the federal government from denying the right to vote to citizens of the United States on the basis of sex. It was adopted on August 18, 1920. Until the 1910s, most states did not give women the right to vote. The amendment was the culmination of the women's suffrage movement in the United States, which fought at both state and national levels to achieve the vote. -
18th Amendment
effectively established the prohibition of alcoholic beverages in the United States by declaring the production, transport, and sale of alcohol (though not the consumption or private possession) illegal. The separate Volstead Act set down methods for enforcing the Eighteenth Amendment, and defined which "intoxicating liquors" were prohibited, and which were excluded from prohibition (e.g., for medical and religious purposes). -
Teapot Dome Scandal
a bribery incident that took place in the United States from 1921 to 1922, during the administration of President Warren G. Harding. Secretary of the Interior Albert Bacon Fall had leased Navy petroleum reserves at Teapot Dome in Wyoming and two other locations in California to private oil companies at low rates without competitive bidding. In 1922 and 1923, the leases became the subject of a sensational investigation by Senator Thomas J. Walsh. -
Political Machines
a political organization in which an authoritative boss or small group commands the support of a corps of supporters and businesses (usually campaign workers), who receive rewards for their efforts. The machine's power is based on the ability of the workers to get out the vote for their candidates on election day. -
William Jennings Bryan
Bryan worked for peace, prohibition, and woman suffrage, and he increasingly criticized the teaching of evolution. -
Jane Addams
Jane Addams, known as the "mother" of social work, was a pioneer American settlement activist/reformer, social worker, public philosopher, sociologist, author, and leader in women's suffrage and world peace and was named a co-winner of the 1931 Nobel Peace Prize. -
Civil rights reform
reformed the civil service of the United States federal government, partly in response to the Watergate scandal. The Act abolished the U.S. Civil Service Commission and distributed its functions primarily among three new agencies: the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), and the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA).
