0.1 The progressive era (part ii)  (Page 8/11)

Regardless if it was at the Carlisle school or any one of the over 150 similar schools throughout the United States by 1900, Indian children were removed from their tribal-familial surroundings and taken to these schools where they would be dressed like Americans, have their hair cut like Americans, and be taught like Americans with the hope that upon graduation these folks who resembled Indians but acted, spoke, and thought like Americans would return to their tribal-familial lands and lead the continued Americanization of their people. Some Carlisle graduates went on to prosper such as a Sioux named Ohiyesa who eventually earned a degree in medicine from the Catholic-run Boston University, completed his transformation by adopting a new name: Charles Eastman and marrying a white woman and the two spent their lives working to help alleviate the plight of Indians throughout the United States. Another Carlisle graduate, Reginald Oshkosh, used the tools he developed to successfully help his people (the Menomonee tribe in Wisconsin) prevent the state and federal governments from illegally seizing tribal lands.

Again, was this more about helping these people or more about controlling these people? Overall, Progressive reformers tended to most ignore the plight (and fate) of Native Americans. In 1924, Indians were recognized as citizens and granted all rights and privileges of citizenship(three years after women were granted the right to vote). Most remain on ancestral lands today.

Women

One might be surprised to see the inclusion of women as a marginalized group akin to Indians and African Americans. On one hand, women during the Progressive Era successfully gained rights that put them on an equal political playing field with men and women certainly were exceptionally active in leading many of the Progressive reform movements, especially in regards to social programs. Nonetheless, not unlike the Gilded Age, if you scratched the golden surface of women’s accomplishments, you would see the dross of how the Progressive Era affected women.

One of the largest reform movements to target women focused on the home. Traditional Victorian homes were too large, nebulous, and ineffectively designed. To help women, some reformers, such as Marion Talbot, called for families to leave their family-unfriendly homes and move into apartments that would be easier for women to clean and manage. Cooking, cleaning, and child-rearing were no longer tasks to be performed without thought or preparation. Instead, housewives could benefit from a more scientific approach to their God-given duties. In response to the scientific management movement “home economics” courses were offered in colleges so that middle-class women could learn how to properly manage all facets of their future husbands’ homes. And while you might conclude that women’s participation in college was necessarily beneficial, in this case these college classes were designed and offered to further entrench sexual division of labor. Women were in charge of governing their homes, and men were in charge of governing the world.