As the western frontier closed, the continent was unified. The Spanish-American War of 1898 and America’s conquest of the Philippines in 1902 added swagger. The industrial dynamism of the United States was unprecedented. Its agricultural exports brought abundance to the world. But, among the progressive reformers of the gilded age, America’s self-image was ambiguous. America was a byword for urban graft, mismanagement and greed-fuelled politics, as much as for growth, production and profit. In search of models of modern government, it was to the cities of Imperial Germany that American experts
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