This book, first published in 1985, investigates the enactment of the federal income tax as a case study of an important Progressive Era reform. It was a critical issue that likely divided people along socioeconomic lines, thus helping to provide insight into the debate over the 'class origins' of the reformist movement.

This book, first published in 1985, investigates the enactment of the federal income tax as a case study of an important Progressive Era reform. It was a critical issue that likely divided people along socioeconomic lines, thus helping to provide insight into the debate over the 'class origins' of the reformist movement.

Buenker and Kantowicz have edited an excellent, handy reference guide to one of the most important, and certainly one of the most written about, eras of American history. Including entries for individuals, organizations, movements, issues, newspapers, laws, and court cases, the dictionary provides concise and up-to-date descriptions as well as bibliographic citations to the secondary literature on the people and events comprising Progressivism and its oppositon. . . . Nearly everyone interested in the Progressive Era will find some important use for this volume. "Choice"

The Progressive Era may be described as a broad-based response by Americans from diverse backgrounds to the emergence of the United States as a modern, urban, industrial, and multicultural world power during the period 1890 to 1920. "The Historical Dictionary of the Progressive Era, 1890-1920" is a comprehensive source detailing the people and events that made this a notable period in American history. The volume provides biographical sketches of the most prominent individuals of the period along with entries on major reform and professional organizations, key legislative enactments, commissions and committees, schools of interpretation, and important concepts. In each entry the contributor presents the most important factual information and an interpretation of the topic's significance. Where applicable, each entry has a bibliography that includes the manuscript collection and the standard and revisionist works on the topic. The dictionary also includes an introductory essay and a chronology of important events. A subject index containing organizations, laws, concepts, states, and cities concludes the work. This historical dictionary will serve as a primary reference source for students and scholars of a significant era in American history.

John D. Buenker describes the boss-immigrant-machine complex of nineteenth-century America, how it developed, and the services it provided for the newly-arrived immigrant. His important new finding is that the so-called “urban political machine” and “boss,” long objects of disdain, were in fact major sources of support for a vast amount of reform legislation during the Progressive Era. The outlook and philosophy of programs that are now considered liberal, Mr. Buenker concludes, largely originated with the urban machine politician and what today would be called the ethnic working class.

This reference volume provides information on the acculturation process of a representative number of ethnic groups in the United States. Each chapter focuses on a specific ethnic group and is written by an authority on the acculturation of that group. The volume includes such groups as the African-Americans, American Indians, Chinese-Americans, Mexican-Americans, and several European-American ethnic groups. Collectively, the chapters provide an excellent source for discerning both the unique experiences of the different groups and the similarities in their acculturation experiences. The book opens with an introductory chapter, providing an overview of the contributors' accounts and discussing the "creative tension" between diversity and unity in American culture. In the following chapters, the authors address similar issues and themes, including (1) the role pf voluntary self-help groups in interactions between the ethnic groups and the mainstream culture, (2) the impact of modernization on traditional culture and values, (3) political strategies used to gain recognition, (4) the continuum in the group ranging from "Americanizers" to "Separatists", (5) the effect of social and residential mobility, (6) integrational change and conflict, (7) the impact of "americanization" crusades, (8) the impact of the American education system, (9) the incidence and impact of exogamous marriage, (10) the role of religion and language maintenance, and (11) the specific variables that determined the pace and degree of acculturarion. Each chapter concludes with a bibliographical essay on the subject ethnic group. A concluding bibliographical essay discusses works on the acculturation process.