History of Chicago from Trading Post to Metropolis
External Studies Program | University College

Module 2 Chapter 2
Reforming the City, 1837 to 1894

Reformers in Chicago in the 1870's and 1880's placed their emphasis on individual moral reform: if only individuals would stop drinking, gambling, and leading un-Christian lives, societies' problems would be solved. During the 1880's, other reformers began to teach that individual reform was not enough. In their view, changes in the structure of society were necessary before poverty could be eliminated, and people could live in peace and happiness. This chapter will discuss the approaches to reform advocated by those who wanted to go beyond individual moral reform.

The Republican party continued to be the major instrument of political reform. During the 1880's it had presented voters with a series of "good government" mayoral candidates who promised to clean-up the city. John Roche had been the only successful Republican candidate in that period, sweeping to victory after the Haymarket tragedy. Two years later, however, the Democrats and the remnants of the Union-Labor party had regrouped and formed an alliance that threatened Roche's reform government. Dewitt Cregier, a city engineer and the Democratic mayoral candidate, ran on a platform dedicated to the eight-hour day and municipal ownership of utilities. The central issue in the campaign, though, was religion. A Democratic newspaper accused Roche of belonging to the United Order of Deputies, a secret, violently anti-Catholic lodge active in the city. Cregier also charged that Roche would ban all alcohol from the city if re-elected. Ironically, several leading prohibitionists in the city attacked Roche during the election because of his failure to enforce Sunday-closing laws while mayor. Roche also suffered from his handling of a street car strike. In the view of many voters, the contract Roche persuaded street car conductors to sign had been far too advantageous to Samuel Yerkes, the streetcar king of Chicago. Because of the various charges against Roche, voters turned him out of office after one term. DeWitt Cregier became the new mayor of Chicago.

The battle between ethnics and Americans reached a peak in the city and state early in 1890. Ethnic groups became incensed over the passage of a new state law that required yearly inspections of all schools in the state. The law also required that certain subjects, like American history and government, be taught in English. Reformers had pressed for the law because, in their view, it guaranteed that every child would attend a state approved school. Reformers also argued that instruction in English would provide every child with an opportunity to learn the language of his native land. Mandatory attendance had never been demanded by Illinois law until the 1889 school law. Reformers had included a mandatory attendance provision in the law to reduce the number of children working in factories, and the number roaming the streets. Ten thousand children, according to one estimate, spent most of their time in the streets of Chicago.

For immigrants the school law represented another fanatic attack on their culture. Many immigrant groups had built and supported private schools, usually affiliated with churches, in order to maintain complete control over the education of their children. They did not want the state to interfere with that education. The requirement for mandatory instruction in English especially upset the ethnics. Their own language had served as an effective barrier to the culture of the Americans. That culture, in the view of many ethnics, taught atheism and materialism. Knowledge of English would destroy Old World traditions and beliefs and weaken the power of parents over their children, whereas a foreign language protected the purity of old world theology and old religious traditions. Any instruction in English would destroy the old world mind: the law had to be repealed. The school issue became a matter of life and death for old world culture.

The Democratic party in Illinois in 1890 called for repeal of the school law. The Republican party, controlling the legislature which passed the law, called only for a reconsideration of the mandatory inspection provision. In the state elections of 1890 the Democrats swept to victory, giving the Illinois Republican party the worst defeat in its history. Ethnic voters had demonstrated their power to oppose it.

In Chicago, the school issue had little effect on the mayoral election of 1891. Most voters thought the state election had solved the issue. The election for mayor became the most complicated in the city's history when four major candidates entered the contest. On the Democratic side, Carter Harrison made an attempt to win his party's backing for a sixth term. The Democrats refused to nominate Harrison, however, and chose DeWitt Cregier, a city engineer, instead.

Hempstead Washburne, an attorney, was the Republican choice. Some Republicans felt Washburne was not tough enough on the liquor question. So they nominated a candidate of their own, Elmer Washburn, a former police chief. Hempstead Washburne promised to clean-up the city but said nothing about closing saloons on Sunday. The Republican party had apparently learned it could not gain votes on that issue.

Under Cregier, Chicago had returned to its "City of Sin" image with gambling and prostitution flourishing. Several scandals had marred the Creiger regime, and the mayor himself appeared weak and ineffective, had the Democratic party not split it would have won the election. Hempstead Washburne won by only 369 votes of 160,500 cast.

VOTE in 1891
H. Washburne	46,957
D. Cregier	46,588
C. Harrison	42,931
E. Washburn	24,027

Despite what many people had thought, the school issue had not been settled by the 1890 election. Democrats recognized the importance of the issue and delayed action on it until after the elections of 1892. In that year, the Illinois school law played a major role in Grover Cleveland's campaign for the presidency. Illinois had not been won by a Democratic presidential nominee since 1856, but in 1892 Cleveland swept the state because of his statements against "enforced education." John Peter Altgeld, a German-American from Chicago, became governor in that year because of his promise to repeal the school law. Altgeld won despite the fact that he had actually helped write the law in 1889; political considerations had helped him change his mind on the benefits of English language instruction. The state legislature finally repealed the law early in 1893. Nationally and in Illinois the Democratic party now had even stronger claims to being the party of the immigrant.

Hempstead Washburne gave the city one of the best administrations in its history. He reformed the police department and the fire department. And during his term, juries returned indictments against some of the most notorious gamblers in the city. Washburne also made certain that utilities paid their taxes and that they obeyed their franchise regulations. He decided, however, not to seek re-election because he felt a city operated best if a mayor served only one term. The constant turn-over of mayors would guard against the building of a political machine.

Carter Harrison wanted to be mayor badly, especially since Chicago had been selected by Congress as the sight of the exposition celebrating the four hundredth anniversary of Columbus' discovery of America. Planning for the World's Columbian Exposition had been in progress since 1889, and the Board of Governors of the Fair were determined to make it the greatest exhibition of human progress in the history of the world. The Fair would make Chicago the focal point of the world during its existence and Carter Harrison wanted to crown his career by being the presiding mayor.

The Republicans had difficulty finding someone to replace Washburne but finally chose Samuel Allerton, a meatpacker. The Democratic party almost split again. It refused to nominate Washington Hesing, publisher of the largest newspaper in the city, and a leader in the German community and, instead, allowed Carter Harrison to seek a fifth term. Hesing threatened to run as an Independent but backed down after Grover Cleveland appointed him Chicago postmaster.

Unfortunately for Samuel Allerton, Republican members of the Chicago School Board picked a time only a few weeks before the election to announce a plan that would eliminate the teaching of foreign languages in elementary schools. That proposal frightened many ethnic voters away from the Republican party. Harrison promised a "wide open town" for the Fair and stuck to that as the principal issue in his campaign. Allerton pledged to run the city on business principles. Republican newspapers returned to the Haymarket tragedy in their accusations against Harrison and charged that the killing of the policemen had been "the inevitable consequences of Mr. Harrison's policies." Despite Republican charges, Harrison defeated Allerton and became the first five term mayor in the city's history. Chicagoans could rest assured that saloons, gambling houses, and prostitution would flourish during the great Columbian Exposition: "Our Carter" was back.

The White City and Plans for a Better World

Planners of the Fair wanted it to be the greatest exhibition in the history of the world. Fourteen thousand men worked in Jackson Park in 1891 and 1892 constructing the buildings and grounds for the Fair. They planted almost a million trees and shrubs and built a huge array of exhibition buildings. Nothing could be too big or too grand for the great White City, as it was named, that would symbolize the power and beauty of human progress. For Daniel Burnham, the chief architect of the Fair, the World's Columbian Exposition would demonstrate to the world the wisdom of science and the importance of planning.

The fair would also celebrate the American spirit. It would show visitors from the rest of the world what hard work, initiative, and the spirit of democracy could produce. Americans, on the other hand, would be educated to the culture of other nations through the giant international exhibits that would be offered. Chicagoans, particularly, wanted to demonstrate that their city, "Porkopolis" as many Easterners referred to it, had the sophistication and knowledge to put on such a huge celebration.

Levi Morton, Vice President of the United States officially dedicated the Fairgrounds in October, 1892. President Benjamin Harrison was unable to attend because of his wife's illness. 800,000 people watched a parade to the Fairgrounds earlier in the day, and over 140,000 gathered to listen to the dedication ceremonies. Morton told the crowd that the exposition was "worth a chance to record the achievement of the two Americas, and to place them side by side with the arts and industries of the older world, to the end that we may be stimulated and encouraged to new endeavors."

Construction delays prevented the opening until May 1, 1893. The newly elected president of the United States, Grover Cleveland, officially opened the Fairgrounds for the 200,000 people who had gathered to witness the exhibits on the first day. The Fair ran for only six months and by its closing in October, 1893, over 27.5 million people had wandered through it. Almost everyone loved the Fair and was awed by the magnificence of the buildings and the raw power of the machinery demonstrations and the electrical technology. The White City was the first in history to use electrical current to activate all its machinery. Theodore Dreiser, then a cub reporter on a Chicago newspaper, wrote: "All at once and out of nothing in this dingy city. . .which but a few years before had been a wilderness of wet grass and mud flats. . .had now been reared this vast and harmonious collection of perfectly constructed and showy buildings, containing, in their delightful interiors, the artistic, mechanical and scientific achievements of the world."

Thus, the World's Fair in Chicago was the grandest and most beautiful in the history of the world for the people who actually saw it. Hundreds of buildings represented almost every state in the nation and most of the countries in the world including Japan, Germany, England, France, Persia, and China. The Manufacturer's Building was the largest roofed structure ever built by man and it displayed thousands of fascinating products, from vacuum cleaners to gigantic turbine engines. People saw more than products of industry at the Fair, however. Hundreds of sculptures, commissioned especially for the exposition, lined the streets of the Fairgrounds and a huge art exhibit introduced many people to French impressionism. The Midway presented the visitors with the opportunity to ride a Ferris wheel for the first time, and gave them an opportunity to see Little Egypt and other dancing girls from around the world. Outside the fairgrounds Chicago lived-up to its reputation as "the wickedest city in the United States." Carter Harrison did not go back on his promise to make Chicago a wide open town; vice flourished. (See the pictures and discussion of the Fair in Mayer and Wade, pages 194 to 200.)

ANSWER QUESTION 3 IN THE REPLY BOOKLET. (Provided after registering for courses through the External Studies Program.)

In conjunction with the Fair, a World's Congress Auxillary convened in Chicago in the summer of 1893, dedicated to a discussion of the great problems of the age. Through speeches and lectures the Congress hoped to present people with a greater understanding of those problems and some practical solutions. Auxillary Congresses devoted to medicine, literature, women, agriculture, religion and a variety of other topics met in the Art Institute and experts gave papers relating the latest advances in their fields. "Not things, but men," was the motto of the Auxillary Congress.

The first week of sessions in the Art Institute dealt with problems of women. Women, for the first time in the history of World's Fairs, had taken part at almost every stage of planning, and had their own building on the fairgrounds. The Women's building, designed by a woman architect, contained exhibits devoted to contributions made by women doctors, artists, writers, and scientists. At the Auxillary Congress, 200 women, including suffragists like Julia Ward Howe, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Lucy Stone, read papers on the status of women. Most concentrated on the roles of housewife and mother and on how to make the best out of those roles, but the very fact that women participated in planning the Fair, and had the first Auxillary Congress devoted to them, revealed that a vast change had taken place in America's attitude toward women.

A Temperance conference, devoted to the medical effects of alcohol, followed the Woman's Congress. At the Congress on Literature, Hamlin Garland predicted that Chicago would soon become the literary center of America. A few weeks later, at the Historian's World Congress, Fredrick Jackson Turner from the University of Wisconsin, read his famous paper on the influence of the frontier on the development of the American character. In all, almost 1300 sessions of the Auxillary Congress were held, and over 700,000 people attended the discussions and lectures.

The largest of the planned Congresses, the World Parliament of Religions, closed out the events in the Art Institute. The Parliament invited every denomination and faith in the world to attend its discussions except the Mormons who were excluded because of their advocacy of polygamy. The organizers of the Parliament wanted it to be the crowning event of the World's Fair in Chicago. For the first time ever, all religious leaders would have the opportunity to exchange views on theology and philosophy. When the Parliament opened in September, representatives from the Shintoists, the Buddhists, the Hindus, the Zoroastrians, the Shakers, the Quakers, the Christian Scientists, the Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox, the Presbyterians, the Lutherans, the Methodists, and dozens of other faiths, were in attendance. Only the Baptists refused to send a delegation because the fair remained open on Sundays.

The Parliament would "stand in human history like a Mount Zion," the opening speaker told the delegates, "crowned with glory and marking the actual beginning of a new epoch of brotherhood." Such hopes guided the proceedings of the Parliament and instilled hopes of future gatherings of religious leaders in the minds of participants and interested observers that the Parliament did provide an example for future ecumenical congresses held in the twentieth century. Its proceedings were published in four huge volumes and sold thousands of copies throughout the world.

The World Congress Auxillary, dedicated to "the contemplation of truths of human life as it ought to be, compared with the facts as they are," as a speaker pointed out, held its last meeting two days before the official closing of the Columbian Exposition on October 30. A huge ceremony had been planned but tragedy intervened, and they were never held. On the evening of the 28th, a disgruntled patronage worker shot and killed Carter Harrison in the mayor's home on Ashland Avenue. The murderer had expected to be appointed corporation counsel by Harrison, but Harrison had appointed someone else. The World's Fair closed with a brief ceremony dedicated to the memory of Carter Harrison.

Several members of the Board of Directors wanted to save some of the Fair's buildings but money for that project was not forthcoming. Daniel Burnham felt particularly disappointed. "We are turning our backs on the fairest dreams of civilization," he wrote, "and are about to confine it to the dust. It is like the death of a dear friend."

In January, 1894 a fire destroyed a few of the exhibit halls and buildings and six months later, during the Pullman Strike, a giant conflagration destroyed all but two of the remaining buildings.

In the six months of its existence the Fair did much to excite the imagination of people and to show them what a city could be like with proper planning, proper sanitation, and proper transportation. Burnham's White City had reaffirmed the belief that a perfect society could be built on earth. Out of the chaos of Chicago--Porkopolis--had arisen a city devoted to order, cleanliness, and beauty. In Chicago, "the surface sewer, which Chicagoans call the river. . .contains sewage and garbage of all kinds," a newspaper reported, and "animals more or less decomposed make it reek. . . . Standing on any of the bridges the odor is sickening." But at the World's Fair people saw that a city that was not dirty and disgusting could be built, if they wanted to do it.

One of the lasting effects of the Fair was the way it inspired the City Beautiful movement which flourished in the United States early in the 20th century, and its most significant contribution was to the development of the city planning movement. Daniel Burnham went on to produce in 1909 the first comprehensive city plan for Chicago. His principles were few and simple: everything in a good plan had to conform to rules of harmony, order and beauty; a city could not be allowed to grow haphazardly; if it did, the result would be chaos.

ANSWER QUESTION 4 IN THE REPLY BOOKLET. (Provided after registering for courses through the External Studies Program.)

The Great Depression of 1893

Visitors to the Fair noted the stark contrast between the Dream City and the real city outside, where conditions for many people became even worse during the latter part of 1893. In other parts of the country earlier in the year a severe depression had broken out, but the Fair had protected Chicagoans from the worst aspects of that depression. When it closed, however, Chicago was hit particularly hard because of the thousands of people who had come to the city to work at the Fair. By December, according to a police department estimate, over 100,000 people in the city had lost their jobs.

An immediate problem for the city became that of replacing Carter Harrison. The Democrats nominated John Hopkins, a young Irishman from Hyde Park, to head their ticket. George Swift, a businessman and alderman, who had been elected interim mayor by the city council, was the choice of the Republicans. The Depression played a major role in the campaign and Hopkins argued that a vote for him would signal Washington that Chicagoans favored Grover Cleveland's proposal for a low tariff because it protected them from the competition of the world market. Swift responded with the Republican case: high tariffs protected the wages of workingmen by keeping cheap foreign goods, made by cheap foreign labor, out of the country. Thus, Swift argued that a vote for him would show Congress that the workingmen of Chicago stood for high tariffs.

In the last few days of the campaign, circulars went out through the mail to thousands of Chicagoans which warned voters that Hopkins was a Catholic and that his election would mean turning over the city to the "foreign element." The Republican party denied sending out the circulars, and later claimed that Hopkins had sent out the anti-Catholic tracts in order to stir up Catholic voters. Voting was heavy in all wards and because of the large majorities that Hopkins rolled-up in Irish and German Catholic precincts he was able to carry the city by 1,300 votes, out of 224,000.

By January 1894, unemployment in Chicago had reached 33% and in some industries, such as iron and steel, had gone over 50%. The depths of the depression caused many people to fear the imminence of violence and revolution. "Coxey's Army" of unemployed had marched on Washington in 1893, and violence and strikes had broken out across the country. Many observers, including Grover Cleveland, felt the cities were powder-kegs of discontent ready to explode at any minute.

The Strike at Pullman

Railroad construction virtually ceased in the United States with the onset of the Depression. The Pullman Palace Railway Car Company lost much of its business as demand for sleeping cars fell rapidly. In the spring of 1894, the Pullman Company announced a cut in wages for all employees, hoping that this would enable it to attract more bids and thus remain in operation.

The town of Pullman had been the scene of a strike in 1886, and the company had handled it by simply waiting until the strikers could no longer afford to stay out. When work resumed, the company made sure the organizers of the strike did not return. There was no place for unions or strikes in George Pullman's world: workers and management lived in a harmonious system in which each person had his place, and what was good for the company was good for all.

Organizers of the American Railway Union, however, infiltrated the Pullman workshops. They met with little success until the announcement of the wage cut in 1894. Rumors that union activists had been fired, and wage cuts, caused a majority of Pullman workers to walk out on strike early in May, 1894.

Employees who lived in the town of Pullman felt the wage cuts would hit them especially hard. Everything in Pullman cost ten to fifteen percent higher than in the rest of Chicago. Wages would be cut, but rents would not be reduced, nor would the cost of groceries, gas, or water. And because wages in Pullman had already been reduced since April 1893 by an average of 28%, a further reduction would be too much for most workers.

The first weeks of the strike were peaceful with many strikers enjoying picnics and ballgames. Chicago newspapers covered the strike fully and in editorials commended the Pullman workers on their good behavior. Relief committees were established by churches and charities to help provide food and clothing for needy families. Company policy during this time reflected the policy of 1886--wait: when the workers get hungry enough they would return to their jobs. George Pullman left the city in May and headed for his island off the coast of Maine.

The strike reached a new stage early in June when the national convention of the American Railway Union, meeting in Chicago, issued a call for a boycott of all trains that carried Pullman cars anywhere in the country. What had begun as a local strike was now turned into a nationwide struggle for power. The boycott began on June 26 and within a few days over 50,000 railway workers were taking part in it.

Chicago became a city under siege. Prices for food and other necessities soared as no trains left or came into the city. On July 3, the General Managers Association, which represented the 24 railroads running out of Chicago, secured an injunction which prohibited the Railway Union, and its president, Eugene Debs, from interfering with interstate commerce and the United States mail. Soon, almost every train which left the city carried a mail car. Debs, however, told his men to ignore the injunctions.

It looked as if a powder keg was about to explode. A mob of about 2,000 people gathered in the Rock Island Railroad yard on the morning of July 3, and refused to disperse when ordered to do so by a United States Marshall. The marshal wired Washington, saying that the situation was out of hand, and asked for federal troops. President Cleveland quickly gave orders to send in troops from Fort Sheridan. Governor Altgeld denounced Cleveland for his usurpation of states' rights, and claimed that accounts of violence were exaggerated. Cleveland stood by his right to protect the mail and to guard interstate commerce and cited the urgent request of the U.S. Marshall. On July 4, federal troops began patrolling the railroad yards of Chicago. On July 5, over 10,000 people gathered in the Union Stock Yards. Railroad officials later claimed the mob had destroyed thousands of dollars in railway property. That same night a fire of mysterious origin destroyed most of the buildings which remained from the World's Fair.

A call for a general strike in Chicago in support of the Railway Union failed as only 25,000 workers participated, and most of them stayed out for only one day. For several days every train that left Chicago had to have an army escort, as striking railway workers attempted to barricade the tracks. But by July 8, calm had returned to most of the city and the troops were removed. Two weeks later, a court sentenced Eugene Debs to six months in prison for criminal conspiracy to obstruct interstate commerce. The American Railway Union suffered a major defeat with the breaking of the boycott and had difficulty regaining the strength it had achieved before 1894. The violence associated with the strike added further evidence to the conviction of many Americans that labor unions and violence went hand in hand.

By August, George Pullman began to re-open his production facilities, but the company rehired only those workers pledged not to join a union. Pullman died two years after the strike but insisted until the end that his kind of "model city" would work given the right conditions. Few other businessmen seemed to agree with him. No other planned industrial communities like Pullman were built. Perhaps the major loss after the Pullman strike was the destruction of the idea that business had other concerns than making money.

Pullman, in the short time before his death, became one of the most unpopular men in Chicago. His funeral, at the instructions of his wife, took place at midnight, and several tons of concrete were poured over his grave to protect if from desecration.

ANSWER QUESTION 5 IN THE REPLY BOOKLET. (Provided after registering for courses through the External Studies Program.)

Jane Addams and the Settlement House Approach to Reform

Daniel Burnham's design for the World's Fair and George Pullman's plan for a model industrial town both represented attempts to reform industrial society from the top down. A plan would be made and people would live according to the plan. The settlement house movement began with a different premise. In the view of the reformers who founded the world's first settlement house in England, a humane industrial society depended on contributions from all classes in the society. Working people had just as much to offer as did college graduates. Settlement houses emphasized the equality of all people and advocated a program of mutual education and communication. One of the major problems in industrial cities was the lack of contact between rich and poor: the settlement house movement would bring the two classes together.

ANSWER QUESTION 6 IN THE REPLY BOOKLET. (Provided after registering for courses through the External Studies Program.)

Many residents of settlement houses were inspired by the religious teachings of the Social Gospel, whose Preachers taught that slum conditions, not individual moral depravity, led people to sin and crime and before these could be eliminated, people had to have enough to eat. Ministers must attend to the earthly as well as the heavenly needs of poor people. Graham Taylor, founder of the Chicago Commons settlement on the near north side, became the leading spokesman for the Social Gospel in the city.

Chicago Commons, founded in 1894, sought to minister to the needs of poor people by establishing a kindergarten, a day nursery, a summer camp, adult education classes, and a series of concerts and lectures. Taylor developed programs for the Commons based on his conviction that the settlement's ultimate goal was "to develop the life of the individual out of a mere self-conscious existence into a personality that shares the life of the whole brotherhood of man and the Fatherhood of God."

ANSWER QUESTIONS 7 AND 8 IN THE REPLY BOOKLET. (Provided after registering for courses through the External Studies Program.)

As with many settlement house workers, Addams underestimated the strength of old world ties and cultural baggage. For example, many of the Italians who settled around Hull House had come from southern Italy. South Italians brought with them a code of honor that demanded a fanatic allegiance to the family that often resulted in bloody feuds. They had not been peasants in the old country but had lived in small villages. In many instances, the whole population of a village moved at the same time and settled in the same apartment buildings or on the same block in Chicago or another city. These transplanted villages brought with them the same inter-familial and inter-regional feuds that plagued southern Italy. Thus, much of the violence in the Italian areas around Hull House had far more to do with the culture of the old country than it had to do with conditions in the new country.

Jane Addams and Johnny Powers

Addams first encountered Powers when she attempted to get a new school built in the Nineteenth Ward. Hull House residents had discovered that more than 3,000 children in the ward could not attend school simply because there was not enough room in the existing buildings. After a petition campaign produced thousands of signatures, the School Board approved the construction of a new school. Powers killed funds for that school, however. He had close ties with Catholic churches in his ward, and many Catholic priests opposed construction of a new public school. Powers listened to them and supported construction of a new parochial school.

Garbage collection was another point of contention between the ward boss and the residents of Hull House. Chicago aldermen controlled garbage collection in their wards, and the position of garbage collector had become a political plum. In chapter 13 Addams describes the conditions she found in Power's ward. He claimed he had the interests of his constituents at heart, yet he obviously did little to improve housing or living conditions and the streets of the 19th ward remained filthy. Yet, Powers kept getting re-elected. Addams recognized that his influence with voters lay deeper than his ability to provide some of them with jobs. Immigrant voters supported Powers because of his style and manner: They wanted someone who dressed like a successful person to represent them. Addams admitted that one mistake that the reform forces made in the 19th ward was to present voters with a candidate who dressed like a common workingman.

Powers not only maintained close contact with the Catholic Church, but contributed heavily to parishes in his ward. In 1898, the Church, fearful of the challenge from Hull House, gave active support to "Johnny de Pow," charging that Jane Addams was anti-Catholic and that the settlement house destroyed immigrant faith and culture. Despite her failure to defeat Powers, Addams did not give up on reform. She simply shifted the focus of her attack from local politics to possibilities of change through state and federal legislation.

Contrary to the experience at Hull House, the reform movement at Chicago Commons had great success in local politics. Voters in that ward sent a dedicated reformer to the city council in 1897, and continued to send reform aldermen including William Dever, a future mayor, for over twenty years. The major difference in the two wards lay in the ethnic composition of the voters. Though Graham Taylor's ward contained many ethnics, it had a much higher percentage of non-ethnic voters than did Jane Addams ward.

ANSWER QUESTION 9 IN THE REPLY BOOKLET. (Provided after registering for courses through the External Studies Program.)

Conclusion

We have discussed three different approaches to reform: city planning, the construction of a model community, and the settlement house movement. We have also discussed ethnic reactions to certain reforms like the school law and mandatory instruction in English. Cultural attitudes brought from the old country hindered the growth of the reform movement, as did the apparent connection between unions and violence. Immigrant cultures protected people from the strange new world of American society. Immigrant neighborhoods actually were small islands separated from the dominant culture by barriers of language, religion, and cultural baggage. The problem of reform lay in the immense barriers that separated people and the question reformers had to ask was how to overcome those barriers in order to develop a more humane society.