Using Journalism(Muckraking) As Reform

By American Industries [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Investigative journalism today is definitely not what it was during the Progressive Era. During the Progressive Era, journalism exposed scandalous and corrupt people/corporations in an effort to better the lives of every American - be they blue collar or white collar. Today though, most of American journalism has gone to hollywood; focusing on the lives of celebrities and their drug abuses [some more than others]. And while this sells the news, and I do buy into because I love celebrity scandal as much as TMZ does, I still want to see scandals on corrupt people who are bringing this country into the shams - and I want to see it on the front page of a newspaper! I don't want to see a picture of Madonna's daughter smoking a cigarette. I want Muckraking  - digging for or through dirt, but it is practically gone from American journalism today. There are a few expose's here and there that highlight some form of corruption, but none that even comes close to the expose's of the Progressive Era, and though there are notable journalists who have greatly influenced the journalism community, their influences in my opinion are frail in comparison to some of the journalists who gladly accepted their title as 'Muckrakers'!

 

Henry Reuterdahl [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

In chapter six of Mightier than the Sword, Muckraking: The Golden Age of Reform Journalism, Streitmatter dives right into the historic background of the Progressive Era. From his description, America was doing extremely well for itself, economically speaking. Every aspect of American society that made money was the leading force in world economics. America wanted to an industrial country, and was made in part by laissez-faire, a policy which meant the government had no interference in the economy; the government was to stay out that sector. This was bad. America was turning "into a nation of the corporation, by the corporation, and for the corporation."(Streitmatter 85). The country was becoming more about the money, and less about the freedom and equality of people - the very thing the Founding Fathers fought for.

By J.E. Purdy; cropped by Beyond My Ken (talk) 10:12, 27 January 2010 (UTC) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

During this switch of 'values', the rights of people were often neglected or outright denied. Workers of conglomerate corporations often had no rights - they worked long hours in miserably awful conditions, and their pay was just enough to get them by. The men behind these corporations were corrupt and money hungry - they were in short fit for a scandal. Journalists, or Muckrakers, a term "coined by President Theodore Roosevelt"(Streitmatter), began to expose things like these. One journalist in particular was good for the details, Ida Minerva Tarbell. She wrote about the monopolists with great detail, but she was known for her gripping narrative style, telling anecdotes of events as if she were there herself. "When she described the youthful Johnny Rockerfeller, she showed the financial cunning had always been his defining trait: "When he was eight years old, he raised a flock or turkeys. The flock was a fine one, for the owner had given its close care, and it was sold to advantage. A boy at eight usually earns to spend. This boy was different."(Streitmatter 89). Tarbell was known as the Queen of muckrakers, for not only did she write a good story, but she did her work, and was a great investigator. Her information was factual, and backed up by loads of evidence.

By Rockwood, New York, New York [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Lincoln Steffens is noted as the first Muckraker. He investigated Municipal Corruption, and was always on the go doing it. He traveled from city to city to expose how "the quest for individual wealth and power infected governmental institutions, organized business, and the low-life criminal element to create a systematic world of graft much larger than its individual parts."(Streitmatter 88) In short Steffens examined municipal corruption and wrote about it in a way that called for reform, something much of the Muckrakers had in common - they all wanted reform, and their way of getting it was through investigative journalism.

By Uncredited Bain News Service photographer. [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Another figure in the Muckraking reform was Ray Stannard Baker. He "earned a reputation as the world's greatest reporter because he totally immersed himself in whatever subject he was studying."(Streitmatter 92) Baker wrote gripping accounts around individuals who were impacted by whatever scandal or reform was going on. One in particular was focused on John Snyder and the miners strike. Snyder continued to work in the mines to feed his family while 17,000 others refused to until their salaries were raised. Snyder's house got burned to the ground while his wife left to visit her mother. When she came back, she tried searching for their furniture, but the neighbors had distributed it to each other. The way Baker reported his story gripped the hearts of his readers. It is what many of the Muckrakers were able to do. They dug deep and got their story, well enough to provoke change into this new era of America. This kind of journalism where you knew there was an uncovered scandal on the front of today's paper is missed.