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Immigration & the American Dream
Idea that promises success to all who reside and work hard in the land of the free and home of the brave. -
Civil Service Reform
A major issue in the late 19th century at the national level, and in the early 20th century at the state level. Proponents denounced the distribution of government offices—the "spoils"—by the winners of elections to their supporters as corrupt and inefficient. -
Populism & Progressivism
Populism is support for the concerns of ordinary people. Progressivism is the support for or advocacy of improvement of society by reform. -
Indian Removal
Was signed into law by President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830, authorizing the president to grant unsettled lands west of the Mississippi in exchange for Indian lands within existing state borders. -
Manifest Destiny
A widely held belief in the United States that its settlers were destined to expand across North America. -
Suffrage
The right to vote in public, political elections -
Homestead Act
Homestead Act encouraged Western migration by providing settlers 160 acres of public land. In exchange, homesteaders paid a small filing fee and were required five years of residency until they could own the land. -
Susan B. Anthony
An American social reformer and women's rights activist who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement. In 1868, they began publishing a women's rights newspaper called The Revolution -
The Gilded Age
An era of rapid economic growth, especially in the North and West. As American wages were much higher than those in Europe, especially for skilled workers, the period saw an influx of millions of European immigrants. -
Urbanization & Industrialization
Industrialization, meaning manufacturing in factory settings using machines plus a labor force with unique, divided tasks to increase production, stimulated urbanization, meaning the growth of cities in both population and physical size. -
Haymarket Riot
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, a person threw dynamite in the crowd and it result in gunfire killing 11 people -
Dawes Act
Authorized the President of the United States to survey American Indian tribal land and divide it into allotments for individual Indians. -
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. Most known for creating the Hull House -
Muckraker
Used in the Progressive Era to characterize reform-minded American journalists who attacked established institutions and leaders as corrupt. -
Andrew Carnegie
Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century and is often identified as one of the richest person ever. -
Eugene V. Debbs
An American union leader, one of the founding members of the Industrial Workers of the World, and five times the candidate of the Socialist Party of America for President of the United States. Best know for the Pullman Strike -
William Jennings Bryan
An American orator and politician from Nebraska. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the Democratic Party, standing three times as the party's nominee for President of the United States. -
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 -
Theodore Roosevelt
An American statesman, author, explorer, soldier, and naturalist, who served as the 26th President of the United States from 1901 to 1909. -
Political Machines
A political group in which an authoritative boss or small group commands the support of a corps of supporters and businesses -
Initiative, Referendum, Recall
Three powers reserved to enable the voters, by petition, to propose or repeal legislation or to remove an elected official from office. -
Upton Sinclair
Wrote the novel The Jungle, which exposed labor and sanitary conditions in the U.S. meatpacking industry, causing a public uproar that contributed in part to the passage a few months later of the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act -
Pure Food and Drug Act
Preventing the manufacture, sale, or transportation of adulterated or misbranded or poisonous or deleterious foods, drugs, medicines, and liquors. -
Ida B. Wells
an African-American journalist, newspaper editor, suffragist, sociologist, feminist, Georgist, and an early leader in the Civil Rights Movement. She was one of the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1909. -
Social Gospel
A movement in North American Protestantism which applied Christian ethics to social problems, especially issues of social justice such as economic inequality, poverty, alcoholism, crime, racial tensions, slums, unclean environment, child labor, inadequate labor unions, poor schools, and the danger of war -
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. -
Dollar Diplomacy
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 -
Federal Reserve Act
An Act of Congress that created and established the Federal Reserve System, and which created the authority to issue Federal Reserve Notes as legal tender. -
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. -
18th Amendment
Effectively established the prohibition of alcoholic beverages in the United States by declaring the production, transport, and sale of alcohol illegal. -
19th Amendment
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex. -
Tea Pot 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 -
Nativisim
Nativism is the political policy of promoting the interests of native inhabitants against those of immigrants. -
Clarence Darrow
An American lawyer, a leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union. He defended high-profile clients in many famous trials of the early 20th century, including teenage thrill killers Leopold and Loeb for murdering 14-year-old Robert "Bobby" Franks -
Third Parties Politics
Any party contending for votes that failed to outpoll either of its two strongest rivals
