How Do People Change America In 1900

Change, something we want but doesn’t always come easy to us. Positive change is what can improve conditions, lives and in turn increase the happiness of a person. America in 1900 was a place needing improvement. Something needed to be done but people had a difference in opinion of how effectively execute actions that would bring change. The expansion of government power and power of the president caused the necessary change needed in the progressive era. Cooperations were a block to people’s pursuit of more improved lives. One group, the railroad corporations, had a hold on people’s use of money because they would form form trusts to create monopolies on rail travel like the Northern Securities company did. Teddy Roosevelt broke up this trust in 1902 and improved people’s lives by lowering travel costs. Roosevelt wasn’t done however. He initiated over forty legal proceedings against these controlling monopolies. This helped clearly show that government was in charge, not big businesses and that government seizing control will improve people’s lives.
It is fair to say that most people are consumers and would benefit from regulation on the quality on the products that they are receiving. People were in uproar after reading The Jungle which described the unsanitary conditions of the preparation of food products. The Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 helped reform the food production industry. It mandated examination of livestock before slaughter and the analysis of the carcasses and the continual inspection of slaughterhouses and processing plants. These and other laws gave the federal government huge power over interstate commerce and ultimately helped give the people better products which enhanced their