ABSTRACT
A few historians refer to prohibition of liquor simply as a progressive measure. Most others, however, discern division within the movement, but they do not draw their dividing lines in the same ways. James H. Timberlake, for example, argues that the liquor question cut the progressive movement into two fairly homogeneous groups. They are: the old-stock middle classes, who favored prohibition; and those identified with the lower classes, who opposed it. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 created, according to Arthur Link, a conflict between "uncompromising" and "middle-of-the-road" progressives. In another sector of the economy, legislation on behalf of workers split the movement into two factions, whom one historian distinguishes as the more conservative "political Progressives" and the more liberal "social Progressives." But even the latter group disagreed occasionally on the extent and the tactics of their general commitment to social welfare on behalf of labor.
