A Laboratory for Democracy: The University Settlement and Application of Wisconsin Progressivism

At the turn of the twentieth century, Wisconsin ushered in a progressive administration under the leadership of Robert M. La Follette, Sr. La Follette turned the state into, as he coined it, a laboratory for democracy by working to ensure a better living experience through the passage of social reform legislation. He brought in experts from all areas to assist his administration and other state lawmakers. Many of these experts were academics from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. It is within this laboratory setting that the University Settlement established in the Walker’s Point neighborhood of Milwaukee.

This settlement set out to serve the Polish community that had settled in the area in an effort to study the living, working, and schooling conditions experienced. Through the study of these conditions, the settlement created and successfully ran many social programs in an effort to keep young people from, what they saw as, corruption and delinquency and provided educational programs to assist parents with childcare and health guidelines. While the settlement did not receive funding directly from the University of Wisconsin system, the settlement directly benefited from the school.

This presentation will show how La Follette’s policies and introduction of academics into social reform assisted in the establishment and success of the University Settlement. In addition to this, it will also discuss the reasoning behind the settlement house being set up in this particular area and how it fit into the larger scheme of the settlement movement in the city of Milwaukee.