The term ‘Progressive’ was co-opted by the Democrats waaay back around the 1920s or so from the Bolsheviks in Russia. Around the time of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, the Bolsheviks quickly discovered that the word ‘communist’ had VERY negative connotations. As a result, they came up with the word ‘Progressive’ to hide their communist agenda.
FDR was a closet socialist who did everything in his power to bring socialism to America. He knew that Americans of the day would NEVER accept terms such as ‘socialism’ and ‘liberalism’, so he used ‘progressive’ to describe his administration.
After that, ‘Progressive’ has been a term that cloaks the true agenda of the Dems. Ironically, I saw a bumper sticker recently that read “No Tea for me, I prefer Progress”.
So, still today, ‘Progressive” is used to cloak the communist agenda of the Democrat Party.
Continue putting out the factual info, this is becoming common info over the last four or five years and leaves the progressives very angry and with much less ammo.
The truth is progressives are anything but progressive. Considering their agenda the word regressive is the correct term.
Inaccurate.
The term became popular in the US around 1890, and was not directly associated with a particular Party.
It referred to people who were "progressive" in their orientation. Much of what the progressives were for was good, such as being opposed to the widespread and remarkably open corruption of the era. But they largely rejected the limited government of the Constitution as merely a hindrance on progress. Which of course it was. That's why they call them "checks and balances."
Both TR and Wilson were progressives, as each party had a progressive and a conservative wing. Wilson in particular was very clear on his disdain for the Constitution, saying it needed to be replaced. This was before liberals/progressives figured out you could just ignore the Constitution.
During the 20s the label fell out of favor, and the term "liberal" gradually replaced it during the 30s.
The notion that one party, the Democrats, was the party of progressives or liberals did not take root until the late 60s/early 70s. Up till then each party had both conservative and liberal wings, as they had since the 1890s. The divide was finalized at the 1972 Dem convention, when essentially all conservatives were purged.
Highly recommend Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg for extended discussion of these issues.