Political Science - History

American Progressivism

Name: American Progressivism
Author: Ronald J. Pestritto
ISBN: 9780739123041

by Ronald J. Pestritto, William J. Atto

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Overview

American Progressivism is a one-volume edition of some of the most important essays, speeches, and book excerpts from the leading figures of national Progressivism. It is designed for classroom use, includes an accessible interpretive essay, and introduces each selection with a brief historical and conceptual background. The introductory essay is written with the student in mind, and addresses the important characteristics of Progressive thought and the role of Progressives in the development of the American political tradition. Students of American political thought, American politics, American history, the presidency, Congress, and political parties will find this reader to be an invaluable source for insight into Progressivism.

Synopsis

This collection of writings by prominent politicians, authors, and activists of the Progressive Era explores Progressivism's role in the development of American political thought. Pestritto and Atto provide insight into each figure's influence on Progressive Era American politics by introducing each entry with the context within which the author of a given selection is writing.

About the Author, Ronald J. Pestritto

Ronald J. Pestritto is Charles and Lucia Shipley Chair in the American Constitution at Hillsdale College and author of Woodrow Wilson and the Roots of Modern Liberalism and Woodrow Wilson: The Essential Political Writings. William J. Atto is assistant professor in the department of history at the University of Dallas.

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Editorials

Burton W. Folsom

Pestritto and Atto have pieced together an excellent collection of essays. The progressives—from Wilson and Roosevelt to Addams and Rauschenbush—emerge clearly in this superb set of primary source essays. We can see in these essays the goals of the progressives to circumvent the Constitution and to try to centralize political power in the hands of the few. I do not know of a better collection of essays on the progressives.

Wilfred M. McClay

The Progressive era is second in importance only to the Founding itself for a clear understanding of American political ideas and institutions. Many of the deepest debates in contemporary American political life, ranging from the authority of the Constitution, to the role of parties and interest groups, to the proper stance of the United States in world politics, are traceable back to their roots in the Progressive era. Yet we have devoted remarkably little attention to the careful analysis of Progressivism, partly because we have not looked carefully at the documents that defined “Progressivism” and served to promote it. But now, thanks to Pestritto and Atto’s thoughtful and carefully assembled anthology, this defect has been remedied. Every serious student of American politics and history will be in their debt for this excellent collection.

Herman Belz

This documentary collection provides a fresh and incisive analysis of seminal texts of the Progressive movement that have been uncritically accepted as timeless truths by elusive and ever-changing liberal relativists. Pestritto and Atto illuminate the intellectual vacuity of the Progessive project to substitute history for philosophy as the standard of political right in America.