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President Clinton speaks at conference on
Progressive Era
President Bill Clinton presented the keynote
address at an academic conference on "The
Progressive Tradition: Politics, Culture and
History" on Princeton University October 5.
The conference was the
occasion for a major scholarly re-evaluation of the
Progressive Era, the two-decade period of political
and social reform that began in 1900 and on
Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, a Princeton
graduate who served as the University's president,
as well as on the era's long-term historical
legacy.
The conference marks the
centenary of Roosevelt's election to the
vice-presidency in 1900 and his ascension to the
White House a year later, following the
assassination of President William McKinley.
"Theodore Roosevelt was
really the first modern activist American
president," said Sean Wilentz, a Princeton
University history professor and conference
organizer. Woodrow Wilson, though from a different
political party and with a different political
philosophy, also used the presidency vigorously to
meet the enormous domestic and foreign challenges
of a new industrializing world."
The discussion was not
limited to debate over the presidents. "To
understand the Progressive Era requires coming to
terms with many great Americans, including
settlement-house workers such as Jane Addams, labor
leaders such as Samuel Gompers, financiers such as
J.P. Morgan, and civil-rights pioneers such as
W.E.B. Du Bois," Wilentz said. "It also requires
coming to terms with the broader political, social,
and cultural currents which all these figures
represented."
The scholarly panels took
place on Friday, Oct. 6 in Helm Auditorium in
McCosh Hall. Speakers and commentators included
renowned senior scholars as well as younger
historians and writers. Among those scheduled to
appear were John Morton Blum, Alan Brinkley, John
Milton Cooper, Richard Epstein, Hendrik Hartog,
Jackson Lears, Michael Lind, Eric Love, Nell Irvin
Painter, Daniel Rodgers, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.,
Christine Stansell, and Henry Yu.
"The Progressive
Tradition: Politics, Culture and History" was
co-sponsored by the Princeton Program in American
Studies and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and
International Affairs.
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