Freedom: The Progressive Movement

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1. What did freedom mean for the ex-slaves? Be sure to address economic opportunities, gender roles, religious independence, and family security. (Chapter 15) For centuries “freedom” has been debated in American History over and over for validating explanations. The word freedom has so many different meanings and influences on the lives of people such as, ex-slaves. In Webster’s Dictionary freedom means being free from constraints but in the eye of an everyday white American in the age of the 1860s freedom could mean achieving what one seeks. In the perspective of an ex-slave, freedom meant being treated equally to whites. Many question whether or not people are actually free, or if freedom is predetermined through a history of events and…show more content…
The progressive era began the movement to reform problems of the United States which was initially to improve the quality of American worker’s lives; the main focus of this was the middle class. The Progressive movement challenged American lives from different aspects which are what makes the era so important. This era successfully brought about big changes economically and politically because of big business regulation and democracy growth even with the government’s social…show more content…
From 1913 to 1921 the president of the United States was Woodrow Wilson whom had Americans fed up which led to Warren Harding winning the next election. This brought a new conservative era in favor of the Republicans. At this moment Harding began the trend of conservative politics in the 1920s. In the economy the Laissez-faire policy took place along with Harding’s “stands off” which basically meant that the government would not get in the middles of people’s business which helped business owners earn more profit. The United States was still in debt from the first Great War which led to the reduction of taxes and this helped the economy to pay off the debt. Also, a large tariff was enforced so Americans could purchase domestic products rather than imported goods. In the 1920s there were important technological advancements. These advancements were inventions such as radios and cars. These inventions lead to an economic boom of the economy growing three percent for six years. Many dangers emerged in the later part of the 1920s; income rose from 1923 to 1929 by about 15 billion dollars although the “Collage Prosperity” was not evenly shared in the United States. While production costs decreased, wages increased slowly and prices constantly stayed the same. Then in late year of 1929 the Great Depression emerged and became the worst economic decline in American
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