A Kansas newspaper editor William A. White compared progressivism to populism in this quote “…shaved its whiskers, washed its shirt, put on a derby, and moved up into the middle class.” Meaning that the development of such ideas were the basis of the populist movement, which consisted of mainly of small farmers, had been taken on by the progressives, who were the cultured, sophisticated and educated urban middle class. On that note, I strongly agree that Progressivism is comparable to the previous ideas of Populism.
From the late 19th to 20th century, citizens sought out to use reform movements seeing them as an idea to approach to change America’s social, economic, and political structures for the greater good. The first to come forward was the Farmers Alliance which gave birth to The Populist Movement. The Populists and Progressives were similar in most aspects, both movements wanted economic equality and equal opportunities, but their differences were merely created by dissimilar classes of supporters.
Populism also referred to as The Populist Movement was mainly supported by small Western non-commercialized farmers whose livelihood had become less feasible in the face of commercialized agriculture. These farmers were mainly from the West and were also in an incredibly large amount of debt to the railroad companies and banks that wanted to protect their occupations and their relatives. Unfortunately they were at the bottom of the social ladder and practically powerless, especially as individuals to the bigger cooperate competition. There were multiple goals and aspects at which they wanted to achieve. Some of the other many aspects also include reintroducing silver as the financial basis instead of gold, graduated income tax, government control and ownership of the railroads, secret ballots, direct election of the United State Senators, immigration restraints, an eight-hour work day, referendum and recall. Populism presented an alternative vision of American economic democracy.