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William Jennings Bryan
Nebraska congressman who gave the famous “Cross of Gold” speech and was the Democratic Party nominee for president in the election of 1896. Known as the “Boy Orator,” Bryan was the greatest champion of inflationary “free silver” around the turn of the century. Although he never left the Democratic Party, he was closely affiliated with the grassroots Populist movement. The Populist Party later chose to back him in the election of 1900. Bryan was the Democratic Party nominee for president in 1896, 1900, and 1908 but lost each time.
Andrew Carnegie
Scottish immigrant who built a steel empire in Pittsburgh through hard work and ruthless business tactics such as vertical integration. Carnegie hated organized labor and sent in 300 Pinkerton agents to end the 1892 Homestead Strike at one of his steel plants. He eventually sold his company to Wall Street financier J. P. Morgan, who used it to form the U.S. Steel Corporation trust in 1901. Around the turn of the century, Carnegie became one of the nation’s first large-scale philanthropists by donating more than $300 million to charities, hospitals, libraries, and universities.
Eugene V. Debs
Labor supporter who helped organize the Pullman Strike in 1894. Debs later formed the Socialist Party in the early 1900s and ran unsuccessfully for the presidency in 1908 against William Howard Taft and William Jennings Bryan.
William McKinley
The 25th US president. He defeated William Jennings Bryan in the pivotal election of 1896. McKinley was president during the Spanish-AmericanWar. He signed the Gold Standard Act in 1900 and was reelected later that year with Theodore Roosevelt as his running mate, but an anarchist assassinated him in Buffalo, New York, in 1901.
J. P. Morgan
A wealthy Wall Street banker who saved the nearly bankrupt federal government in 1895 by lending the Treasury more than $60 million. Morgan later purchased Andrew Carnegie’s steel company for nearly $400 million and used it to form the U.S. Steel Corporation in 1901. Morgan represented the accumlation of wealth and power that Progressive Era ideals were opposed to.
John D. Rockefeller
Industrialist who founded the Standard Oil Company in 1870. An incredibly ruthless businessman, Rockefeller employed horizontal integration to make Standard Oil one of the nation’s first monopolistic trusts. Rockefeller was the prototypical Gilded Age “robber baron” that Progressive Era laws sought to curb and control.
Theodore Roosevelt
Twenty-sixth U.S. president, who took office after the assassination of William McKinley in 1901. Roosevelt, already famous for his aggressive policies, continued them as president both at home and abroad. His domestic policies, collectively known as the Square Deal, sought to protect American consumers, regulate big business, conserve natural resources, and help organized labor. His Roosevelt corollary to the Monroe Doctrine asserted American influence and power in Latin America. Although Roosevelt endorsed William Howard Taft in 1908, he split the Republican Party by running against Taft in 1912 on the Progressive Party, or Bull Moose Party, ticket.
William Howard Taft
Theodore Roosevelt’s handpicked successor and the 27th president. Taft, who had previously served in the McKinley and Roosevelt administrations as Governor-General of the Philippines and Secretary of War, was elected in 1908 on a Progressive platform. Taft ultimately alienated himself from his fellow Republicans by supporting the Payne-Aldrich Tariff and firing conservationist Gifford Pinchot. He and Roosevelt split the Republican Party in the election of 1912, giving Democrat Woodrow Wilson an easy victory. He was appointed as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court by Warren Harding in 1921, where he would serve until shortly before his death in 1930. Taft is the only person to have ever served as both president and chief justice.
Woodrow Wilson
Governor of New Jersey and former president of Princeton University who became the 28th president of the United States. Wilson entered the White House in 1913 after defeating Republican incumbent William Howard Taft and former president Theodore Roosevelt. Wilson’s New Freedom domestic policies called for lowering the protective tariff and taming big business. The significant Progressive achievements of Wilson’s first term are now somewhat overlooked due to Wilson’s association with World War I, which dominated his second term following his narrow reelection in 1916.
