The Populist Progressive Grudge Match

Politicians are always eager to take up the populist label. The Progressive legacy though, even before Glenn Beck took aim, has always been more fraught.

Click here for part 1 and part 2 of this series.

The Progressives of a century ago were the antipode to the Populists. The Populists were Southern and rural; the Progressives Northern and urban. The Populists wanted more local control of the economy; the Progressives wanted better local government. The Populists mistrusted business; the Progressives mistrusted politics. The ultimate Populist nightmare: financial bosses in a far-away city setting disadvantageous interest rates. The ultimate Progressive nightmare: party bosses in a smoke-filed room choosing corrupt political officials.

Yet for their many differences, the two movements considerably overlapped enough in their specific demands.

* Populist pressure helped to achieve the 16th amendment and the federal income tax in lieu of high 19th century tariffs; regulation of railway rates; and the first antitrust laws.

* Progressives pushed for reforms to reduce the power of professional politicians: city manager forms of government, the initiative and referendum process, primaries in place of party conventions, and direct election of senators.

There were differences: Progressives were generally uninterested in the labor movement, a big Populist concern; Populists, not much interested in temperance and women's suffrage, two issues dear to Progressives.

Sometimes the two movements blended into each other. It was the Populist demand for currency reform that led to the creation of the Federal Reserve, an institution that uneasily blended Populist preference for local control of banking (represented by the different Reserve banks headquartered in regional centers) with Progressive zeal for technical expertise and political independence.

Both movements soon faded into history. Yet they left behind a sensibility, a language, an approach to politics available to future generations of Americans to rediscover and redeploy.

The Populist legacy is one that politicians are always eager to claim. Who does not wish to present himself as speaking for "the people"?

The Progressive legacy has always been more fraught, even before Glenn Beck discovered that a broadcaster could gain eyeballs by (tendentiously) re-litigating the political battles of a century ago.

Yet fraught as it is, it is also fertile - and ripe for rediscovery and redeployment.

More to come...