The Progressive Era: Teddy Roosevelt (The Square Deal)

Hi, everyone, and welcome

back to Heimler's History.

Now, in the last lecture we talked about

the Progressive Era in general,

and now we're going to talk about

the Progressive Era in particular.

And I'd like to talk about this era

through the eyes of one man,

namely Teddy Roosevelt.

Now, I have to admit I have kind

of a man-crush on TR because he's pretty

much the manliest president

America has ever known.

This was the guy who on one occasion was

climbing a podium to give a campaign

speech, was shot in the chest,

and then finished the speech.

All right, enough of my swooning.

Let's get to it.

(It's time to kick it old school).

[MUSIC]

Okay, if there's one president

to associate with the progressive

agenda, it's Teddy Roosevelt.

Now it's true that Taft and Wilson were

also progressivists,

but it was Roosevelt who really

helped the movement pick up steam.

His cornerstone program for progressivism

was what was known as the Square Deal,

and it included the three Cs: control

of corporations, consumer protection,

and conservation of natural resources.

Okay, let's look at each of these in turn.

First, control of corporations.

Now, this tenet of the Square Deal

was tested immediately.

In 1902, a strike broke out in the

anthracite coal mines of Pennsylvania.

The mine owners refused to negotiate

with the miners because it was winter

and they believed that as Pennsylvanians

began to feel the bite of winter without

coal, they would rise up and pressure

the workers to get back to it.

And as coal supplies dwindled,

schools and factories and hospitals

were forced to shut down.

Roosevelt perceived how desperate

the situation was and he invited leaders

from both the workers and the mine owners

to the White House hoping

that he could arbitrate.

And it didn't take long before Roosevelt

was profoundly annoyed by,

"The extraordinary stupidity

and bad temper of the mine owners."

He later admitted that if he had not

been the president and therefore in need

to maintain some modicum of dignity,

he would have, "Chucked them out

the window by the seat of their britches."

So finally, Roosevelt said to these

people, "If you don't come

to an agreement,

I am going to seize the mines and have

them operated by federal troops."

After which the mine owners backed down

and grudgingly accepted

the terms of the mine workers.

All right, let's stay with the first C

just a little bit longer so I can tell you

about how much President Roosevelt

loved to break up trusts.

Let me try to illustrate

to you what a trust is.

Let's say I'm in the back-waxing business,

very lucrative industry, and my business

is called Follicle-Follicle-Follicle.

And then further suppose that there's

another back-waxing company

in town called Backs to the Future.

Now, if our two companies were in perfect

competition as they would be in a pure

free market, each of the companies would

try to cut prices and offer

incentives to gain more customers.

And in that case,

it's good for the customers.

But if I over

at Follicle-Follicle-Follicle decide

to team up with the people over at Backs

to the Future, we could set up a trust.

In this scenario, we two companies would

set the price for the services

and then share customers.

One for you, one for me.

And in this scenario,

the prices are always going to be higher

than in a competition scenario because we

are no longer in competition,

and that's good for the company,

but bad for the customer.

So, this is what Teddy Roosevelt

wanted to break up.

Because, as a rule, progressives advocated

for the people against corporations.

But you should know that Roosevelt didn't

just attack trusts indiscriminately.

He understood that large corporations

were not necessarily evil.

He distinguished between good trusts

and bad trusts, and he

went after the bad ones.

Over the course of his presidency,

Roosevelt brought over 40 cases against

trusts so that he earned himself

the nickname "Trustbuster."

And all of this was to make a point,

namely that the government was in charge

of the country, not corporations.

Okay, let's look at the second C

of the Square Deal: consumer protection.

Now, in another lecture I mentioned

Upton Sinclair's expose on a Chicago

meatpacking plant called "The Jungle.",

Well, Teddy Roosevelt happened

to read this book and he was sickened.

So, Roosevelt appointed a special

investigation into the meatpacking

industry, and as it turns out,

Upton Sinclair was not exaggerating.

The report mentioned that it was not

unusual for workers to scoop up poisoned,

dead rats, mix them together with a few

pieces of scrap rope ends,

moisten it with some water that had leaked

through the roof onto the floor,

and call that potted ham.

And people were eating this stuff.

So, in the interest of protecting

the consumer,

Roosevelt worked with Congress to pass

the Pure Food and Drug Act

and the Meat Inspection Act of 1906.

All right, let's hasten to the third C

of the Square Deal,

namely conservation of natural resources.

When Americans began westward expansion

in earnest,

it seemed to them that America's

natural resources could never dry up.

But in the industrial boom of the late

19th and early 20th centuries,

the progressives,

and especially Teddy Roosevelt,

grew increasingly concerned about

the vanishing American wilderness.

Now, being an avid outdoorsman himself,

Roosevelt longed to preserve

the nation's forests.

By 1900, only about a quarter

of the virgin timber was

remaining on American soil.

Lumbermen had taken the rest

in the interests of manufacture.

In response to this,

Roosevelt set aside 125 million acres

in the western region as federal reserves.

These were eventually to become national

parks like Yosemite and the Grand Tetons.

And it was the preservation of these lands

which was probably Teddy Roosevelt's

most enduring legacy to America.

For these lands to disappear, he argued,

would be the eclipse

of individualism and democracy.

He talked about the nation as if it

had a soul, and for Roosevelt, it did.

He said that he felt that whenever he

stood among the redwoods of California

that he had passed into his soul,

or that it had at least passed into him.

And so, it shouldn't surprise

us to hear him talk like this.

He said, "There can be nothing

in the world more beautiful than Yosemite.

The groves of the giant sequoias

and redwoods, the canyon of the Colorado,

the canyon of the Yellowstone,

the Three Tetons.

And our people should see to it that they

are preserved for their children and their

children's children forever,

with their majestic beauty all unmarred."

And whatever else you think about

Roosevelt's politics, I think he

was really onto something here.

And that's all for Roosevelt

and his Square Deal.

I'll see you next time.