“”By: Marina Bluvshteyn 813During the late 1800s and the early 1900s there were many problems inthe world.
People came together because of what they thought was right. Some problems took more work than others to solve. Different methods wereused by reformers. Some reformers had more power than others and madegreater changes than others. Things like the 1901 New York State TenementHouse Law and the Pure Food and Drug Act were passed because people puttheir feet down and said that they’ve had enough.
President Roosevelt was mostly responsible for the passing of the PureFood and Drug Act. This act prohibited the manufacturing, sale, ortransportation of mislabeled or contaminated food. Roosevelt had areputation for making laws, acts, and trusts. At first Congress dint wantto pass this act, but after a few compromises the act was passed. Important people like the president weren’t the only people who helped passlaws, and/or acts; ordinary people helped too.
Women wrote letters toCongress saying that it would be best if food was examined before sold orshipped somewhere. Every voice counts. Another law called the New York State Tenement House Law was passed in1901. This law concerned most immigrants.
It outlawed the construction ofdark and airless tenements. The law required new buildings to have betterventilation, toilets, and running water. New York’s law became a model forhousing reform in other states. Many progressives also establishedsettlement houses patterned after Jane Adams’s Hull House. Theseorganizations worked in immigrant and poverty-stricken communities toimprove education, sanitation, and housing conditions. Progressives andMuckrakers (Journalists) were mostly the cause of the passing of this law.
Muckrakers mostly focused their stories on poor people like immigrants;they helped spread the word of the terrible housing conditions. Progressives let the problems be known in other ways. Even though the new law was passed there was still more work to bedone. In 1909 hundreds of reformers gathered at the first NationalConference of City Planning and Congestion. Supporters of city planningproposed to get rid of unsafe housing, to develop more park land, and toimprove public transportation. After the planning was put to the testdeath rates dropped and there was less pollution in the air and on theground.
Soon urban Americans came to enjoy the highest standards of publicservices in the world. Many other laws, and acts were past after and before this law and act. People with a lot of power weren’t the only ones who made things possible,ordinary people did too. The New York State Tenement House Law was anexcellent law to pass. It helped save lives and made New York a cleanerplace to live in.
The Pure Food and Drug Act was also an excellent idea,food is now safer to eat. There are still problems in our world today, andpeople do try to solve them, but it takes more than one person toaccomplish something.
