Municipal governments created a great problem for the Progressives. Many big-city governments were tied in with corrupt “bosses.” Other issues that surrounded municipal governments, like bribed police, slumlords, and prostitution, could not be resolved when they were presided over by corrupt authorities, as seen in The Jungle. Packingtown was basically owned by the meat industry, which controlled employment as well as housing, and was helped by the mayor, Mike Scully, who was reelected year after year by fixing elections and helping out new immigrants with pitchers of beer. “Scully held an important party office in the state, and bossed even the mayor of the city, it was said; it was his boast that he carried the stockyards in his pocket” (95). Whenever someone became entangled with the law, corrupt government officials could hire people to testify against him, or policemen to arrest him under false pretenses, or a judge to convict him, unless this man had connections up the social ladder. Some of these corrupt practices occurred on a higher level as well, like with senators. Workers also had trouble with accident liability and other compensation, which Jurgis found out after the accident digging telephone tunnels underground. “He might possibly have sued the company, and got some damages for his injuries, but he did not know this, and it was not the company’s business to tell him” (224). Muckrakers had exposed the close ties between greedy corporations and congress. For example, in The Jungle, after Jurgis got into his second fight with Connor, he learned from an officer that Connor was not one to be trifled with anymore. “He’s one of Scully’s biggest men-he’s a member of the War-Whoop League, and they talked of sending him to the legislature! Phil Connor! Good heavens!” (275). It was near impossible to resolve social issues when the leader is connected like a marionette to other city “bosses” who only look out for themselves.
Progressives worked hard tirelessly to suppress these “red-light” cities which perpetuated crime and corruption. To alleviate problems such as these, numerous state legislatures passed corrupt-practice acts, restricting the amount of money candidates were allowed to spend on an election, as well as gifts from large corporations (for which they would expect favors later.) With bribery, congressmen felt more compelled to obey those who were funding him, rather than the masses he was representing. Because of these grafts, Progressives also worked to establish direct election of U.S. Senators, which, after much pressure and difficulty going through Congress as the richer men were content with the current conditions, was finally approved as the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1913. The working class also tried to voice their plights without government aid by joining labor unions. However, courts were not fond of them and many were quick to issue court orders to halt striking and boycotting. Municipal governments were major boulders that had to be overturned to reach the underlying problems.
Among the major dangers to the public wellbeing was sanitation. With so many people crowded into jam-packed buildings, diseases, fleas, and bedbugs spread like wildfire. In rural areas, there was virtually no waste. Food scraps were fed to the animals, and ripped clothing was mended, not discarded. In the city, things came disposably. When clothes went out of style, they were thrown out. Bottles, bags, and cartons were made for throwing away. Refuge and human waste was thrown out the window to join mounds of stench in the street, for which draft animals were in charge of taking care of. Slums grew more crowded, and the “dumbbell” tenements only made things worse. They were named so because of the outline of its floor plan. They were eight stories high with dark, dank, smelly air shafts providing negligible ventilation, into which people conveniently tossed, only to have the odor circulated around the building. There was usually one shared toilet in the hall, which did not promote personal hygiene. Sanitation in the workplace was another major issue. The slaughter house where Jurgis first worked was unheated in the winter and a festering hole in the summer. The boss would always turn a blind eye as diseased cows with tuberculosis, which by law were supposed to be disposed of in a particular way, went along with the other meat as not to waste money. Other unwanted parts (along with piles of poisoned rats, rope ends, splinters, and other debris) were tossed into a grinder, then pickled to make canned meat, as found by a special investigation commission. Disgusted European governments even threatened to ban all American meat imports. In The Jungle, Dede Antanas found out firsthand of the dirty little secrets of the meat packing industry. “The floor was filthy, yet they set Antanas with his mop slopping the “pickle” into a hole that connected with a sink, where it was caught and used over again forever. There was a trap in the pipe, where all the scraps of meat and odds and ends of refuse were caught, and every few days it was the old man’s task to clean these out, and shovel their contents into the trucks with the rest of the meat” (65). Disease was also prevalent in many jobs of the time. In the cooking rooms of the meat packing plants, “”the germs of tuberculosis might live for two years, but the supply was renewed every hour. There were those who worked in the chilling room, and whose special disease was rheumatism; the time limit that a man could work in the chilling rooms was said to be five years” (101). These diseases plagued the working class, though managers knew that there were always hundreds of workers outside the front gates waiting for their chance. Sanitation in the urban areas not only threatened the health of the workers there, but also consumers at large.
Many sanitation reforms originated from the executive branch himself. Because Roosevelt was so sickened by Sinclair’s The Jungle, he was moved to appoint a special investigation commission, who discovered what canned ham was actually made of, to the public’s disgust. Roosevelt also asked Congress to pass the Meat Inspection Act of 1906, which declared that prepared meat shipped over state borders would be subject to federal inspection at each step along the way. Though larger corporations resisted parts of the act, it would help them to drive smaller companies out of business, and their exports would receive the government’s recognition. Progressives were also glad to announce the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, which prevented the tarnishing and mislabeling of foods and pharmaceuticals. There was also legislation at the local level, with the City Commissioner Plan, which hired city experts to handle an aspect of the city life. For example, the Sanitation Commissioner would be in charge of garbage removal. There were also minimum housing codes that attempted to eliminate slums by setting safety standards for tenements. Sanitation was a major issue that threatened the workers upon which society was built.
What many working men found to be the answer to their problems at home and work could be found at the bottom of a bottle of beer at the corner saloon. Naturally, this attracted the wrath of progressives. Alcoholism could quickly use up a family’s combined paycheck, but bartenders awaited the depressed working men with open arms. Alcohol was closely associated with prostitution, corrupt officials, and buying over voters. This theme arises throughout The Jungle. Alcohol was first used to buy Jurgis’s vote for Mike Scully. This was the kind of action that perpetuated corruption in the government, because as long as there were immigrants who were thirsty for alcohol and unfamiliar with the candidates and their crooked, behind-the-scenes workings, there would be someone to vote for the person buying the drinks. Then after every tragic accident, Jurgis went to drown his sorrows with liquor, and threw away weeks worth of savings (both his, as well as his family’s) down the drain. “Have you any money?” he demanded. “Nearly three dollars, Jurgis.” “Give it to me” Three doors away was a saloon. “How much is the bottle?” he said. “I want to get drunk.” (190). Moreover, during the winter, the saloons were the only safe place to keep warm, as long as he kept buying drinks. “Jurgis was obliged to make the price of a lodging, and a drink every hour or two, under penalty of freezing to death” (229). At one point, he resolved to not spend a cent except for to buy drinks at the tavern so he would be able to stay inside. As soon as anyone would stop drinking, their welcome in the saloon ran out. For many, the tavern became a second home, and for some, even a first home. As their alcoholism grew and ate up their lives, their wallets shriveled up with their family’s stomachs.
Progressives thought that if they could halt alcoholism, they might also be able to put an end to its adjoining problems. These anti-liquor reformers were helped by other groups, such as the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, founded by Frances E. Willard who helped assemble a million women to form the largest organization of women in the world. The Anti-Saloon League also played a key role because they were assertive, structured, and had sound financial backing. The temperance movement was pushed largely by women, who wanted improvement for their family, and for other working women and children whose families were threatened by alcoholism. Later on, many states and counties passed “dry” laws to control alcohol. Then came the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919 established prohibition in the United States, banning the manufacturing, sale, and transportation of intoxicating liquors. Alcoholism created problems at home, and the women took it upon themselves to solve them.
At the turn of the century in 1900, new immigrants flooded the cities. With these new immigrants arose problems that the Progressive Party members sought to alleviate. Women’s rights was a major issue that had been pushed aside for a while. The federal government created bureaus for women and children, and legislation to protect their weaker bodies from the detrimental effects of factory labor. Corrupt municipal governments terrorized cities and tainted the reputation of American justice, which led reforms to push the Seventeenth Amendment, allowing direct election of senators to undercut the powers of large corporations who wanted to “buy” government officials. Cities turned to slums as workers were forced to crowd into ill-lit, barely ventilated, vermin infested buildings because of their mediocre paychecks. Sanitation in the home and at the workplace ran at a minimum, as a foul odor loomed over the city and unimaginable refuge made it into the public’s food. To assuage this problem, Roosevelt created the Meat Inspection Act as well as the Pure Food and Drug Act to protect the public from tainted goods. Alcoholism was also fought furiously by women who wanted safer homes, free of the daunting effects of liquor, and in 1919, Prohibition was established. In a time before minimum wages and safety codes, many urban zones were in dire need of improvement, and the Progressives fought for them.
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