Progressive Era and New Deal Legal History (1900-1945)

Introduction

The Progressive Era and New Deal period, from roughly 1900 to 1945, was a transformative era in American legal history. The period saw the rise of the regulatory state, the Lochner era of substantive due process, the New Deal constitutional revolution, and the establishment of the administrative state. The legal developments of this period fundamentally changed the relationship between government and the economy.

The Lochner Era

The Lochner era takes its name from Lochner v. New York (1905), in which the Supreme Court struck down a New York law limiting bakers’ working hours. The Court held that the law violated the liberty of contract protected by the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. The decision established an era of judicial protection of economic liberty against state regulation.

The Lochner era saw the Court strike down numerous economic regulations, including minimum wage laws, price controls, and restrictions on employment. The Court distinguished between regulations that protected health and safety (upheld) and those that redistributed wealth or interfered with contractual freedom (struck down).

The Progressive Movement

The Progressive movement sought to use law to address social and economic problems created by industrialization. Progressive reforms included antitrust enforcement, workplace safety regulation, food and drug regulation, and the creation of administrative agencies. The Federal Trade Commission, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Federal Reserve System were all created during this period.

The Sixteenth Amendment (1913) authorized the federal income tax. The Seventeenth Amendment (1913) provided for direct election of senators. The Nineteenth Amendment (1920) guaranteed women’s suffrage.

The New Deal Constitutional Revolution

President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal legislation faced initial resistance from the Supreme Court, which struck down several key programs as exceeding Congress’s commerce power and violating the separation of powers. The Court invalidated the National Industrial Recovery Act, the Agricultural Adjustment Act, and other New Deal measures.

The Court’s resistance prompted Roosevelt’s court-packing plan of 1937, which proposed adding justices for every sitting justice over age 70. Although the plan was not enacted, the Court dramatically shifted its jurisprudence in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (1937), upholding Washington state’s minimum wage law and abandoning Lochner-era economic due process.

The Rise of the Administrative State

The New Deal created numerous administrative agencies with broad regulatory authority, including the National Labor Relations Board, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Federal Communications Commission. The constitutional legitimacy of these agencies was challenged but ultimately upheld in decisions that recognized Congress’s broad power to delegate authority.

Conclusion

The Progressive Era and New Deal period transformed American constitutional law. The Lochner era’s protection of economic liberty gave way to a broad deferential standard for economic regulation. The New Deal constitutional revolution established the modern regulatory state and expanded federal power under the Commerce Clause.