Freedom and Women in the Progressive and New Deal Eras

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Freedom and Women in the Progressive and New Deal Eras
Introduction
The Progressive Era was a period in the history of America marked by radical urbanization and industrialization between the years the 1890s and 1920s. During this time, many immigrants from South-eastern Europe were pouring into America. As a result, there were many people in the towns than the houses and many resorted to slums where the living conditions were pathetic with constant disease breakouts and high child mortality rates. The party bosses controlled the power, and the owners of the factories ignored the conditions of the workers were living in the slums. However, these problems were exposed by the journalists such as Ida Tarbell who was a female journalist who took the lead in exposing unethical practices by the Standard Oil Company. On the other hand, the New Deal was simply a set of new plans introduced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in an attempt to restore the nation after the great depression that hit America since 1929 to 1939. New Deal consisted of four goals and achievements laid by Roosevelt. The first one was the economic recovery through which America stabilized the banks getting rid of the negative effects that were brought about by the collapse of the stock market. The country stabilized agriculture and industrial prices. The second achievement was job creation to re-absorb the retrenched workers and third was an investment in public works that included the building of schools, hospitals among many other public utilities. Last was the uplifting of civic living standards. These two eras saw growth of women freedom and challenges that were similar and different at the same time. This paper is going to analyze, compare and contrast the women freedom and achievements during these two periods.
Women Progress in the Progressive Era
The progressive movement was ignited by the urge to overcome the harsh conditions that were presented to the residents by urbanization and industrialization. Major reforms set in with the incoming president Theodore Roosevelt in 1901(Bingham 17). The job market was growing too and together with the reform phase that saw a change in lifestyles; women got a chance to participate in the movement also. With new businesses, women began to take part as saleswomen and clerks which motivated more and more women into the industry. Household conveniences were availed by the mass production that was being experienced, and this created more leisure time for women of the second class. Education was expanding the opportunities to the citizens(Bingham25). However, the society was still male-dominated, and the efforts of women to liberate themselves were still being undermined by the Victorian view of the women. Women were denied the right to vote and at the same time married women could not enter into contracts without seeking approval from their husbands. The women reformists of this era had to confront the view that women were both intellectually and emotionally inferior(Bingham27).
The journey of women liberation began with resentment of the restraints that the society imposed on. Key woman reformist was Jane Addams. She typified the thoughts of the former group of college-educated women who chose to resent marriage as it was through marriage that the freedom of women was easily restrained(Gardner 472). Jane was the founder of Hull House in Chicago that served the satisfaction of the socially conscious women like herself. Hull House served as an example to other women that they could pioneer something in the society. Jane employed many women to work in the Hull House. Hull House motivated the women to become aware of the politics, and soon they become the social reformers who began championing for the end of child labor, addressing the problems of the city as well anticipating for improvement of working conditions (Gardner 481).
Jane Addams participated in the suffrage movement, social reforms, and women peace movement. Jane worked with Roosevelt campaigning for his election since his party had a huge provision for social reforms as well as women suffrage movements. Different settlement workers diversified research in different topics, and each took a different path. Florence Kelly undertook sweatshop conditions, and she let to the passage of first Illinois factory safety statute (Bingham 189). She was appointed and became the first factory inspector. Louis Brandeis, Supreme Court Justice conducted her research on the legitimacy of the Oregon law which she defended to see that women's' labor hours were reduced. Kelly worked hard in liberating women, and in 1903 she pioneered the National Women's Trade Union League which included both the middle class and working women who were of the unionization ideas (Gardner 504).
The reformist women of this era were aware of the limitations that the society held against women and they knew that it would be difficult to venture in professions that were dominated by men. They then resorted to expanding on the settlement houses in which they used to deal with the concerns of children and women (Thompson 49). Julia Lathrop was instrumental in fighting against child labor, and she pressed the government into establishing an agency that dealt with the menace. Her efforts saw the establishment of a Children's Bureau under the Department of Labor and Commerce in the year 1912. Julia was appointed as the administrator and used the opportunity to employ many graduate women from the Hull House (Thompson 53). On the other hand, Lillian Wald established Henry Sreet Settlement House for training nurse in New York. She promoted public health service and autonomous nursing body. Another woman who participated in the research included Grace Abbott who researched on the urban immigrant problems, and together with Sophonisba Breckenridge founded the social work as a valid education field (Thompson 59).
Women had been fighting so hard for voting rights since 1848, but they finally achieved it through the efforts of suffragettes Anna Howard Shaw, Carrie Chapman Catt, and Alice Pau. The Nineteenth Amendment was ratified in 1920 granting women full voter rights. Other activist included Mary Church Terrell and Ida Wells-Barnett who established the African American women suffrage organization (Bingham 86). The passing of the Nineteenth Amendment was not an easy task as the opponents of the idea w...