In a lucid though not terribly original account, Canadian historian Levine (Scattered Among the Peoples: The Jewish Diaspora in Ten Portraits
) charts the reform efforts of the early 20th century. Woman suffrage, prohibition, organized labor, regulation of the sex trade—these political movements don't fit neatly into today's red state/blue state categories, but they were each part of the fin-de-siècle vision of a society rid of physical and moral ills. Cities took on great symbolic value: some activists believed cities to be seedy and dissolute; others saw the urban landscape as a place of promise and cultural experimentation. New immigrants flocked to North American cities, and reformers like Jane Addams helped them assimilate into American culture and learn American values (which, as Levine points out, were white, middle-class values). Eugenics was also on the rise; scientists and policy makers alike sought to breed better citizens, in part by sterilizing the supposedly unfit. Levine's rendition of this familiar history is made fresh only by his integration of the U.S. and Canada into one story. Canadians, he argues , often "studied American solutions" to problems that both countries faced. (Mar.)
