Editing Thomas R. Marshall (section)

===Progressive agenda===
[[File:Midnight at the glassworks2b.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Two adolescent child laborers with dirty faces working in a glass factory at midnight|Children at an Indiana glass factory. [[Child labor]] was ended in Indiana by Marshall's child labor laws.]]

Marshall was inaugurated as Governor of Indiana on January 11, 1909. Since his party had been out of power for many years, its initial objective was to appoint as many Democrats as possible to patronage positions.<ref name = g237>Gugin and St. Clair, eds., 2006, p. 237.</ref> Marshall tried to avoid becoming directly involved in the patronage system. He allowed the party's different factions to have positions and appointed very few of his own choices. He allowed Taggart to manage the process and pick the candidates, but signed off on the official appointments. Although his position on patronage kept peace in his party, it prevented him from building a strong political base.<ref>{{harvnb|Bennett|2007|p=90}}</ref>

During his term, Marshall focused primarily on advancing the progressive agenda. He successfully advocated the passage of a [[child labor law]] and [[Political corruption|anti-corruption]] legislation. He supported popular election of U.S. Senators, and the [[Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|constitutional amendment to allow it]] was ratified by the [[Indiana General Assembly]] during his term.<ref name="Bennett 2007, p. 114">{{harvnb|Bennett|2007|p=114}}</ref> He also overhauled the state auditing agencies and claimed to have saved the government millions of dollars.<ref name = g237/> Various measures aimed at improving working conditions were also approved,<ref>[https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.c2740522&seq=9 History of the Indiana democracy, 1816-1916 / by John B. Stoll [and others], P.427-428]</ref> together with a bill that sought to improve tenement housing conditions in Indiana's two largest cities.<ref>[https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Albion_Fellows_Bacon/v_flvpKK1nUC?hl=en&gbpv=0Albion Fellows Bacon Indiana's Municipal Housekeeper By Robert G. Barrows, 2000, P.58]</ref> He was unsuccessful in passing the rest of the progressive platform agenda items or persuading the legislature to call a convention to rewrite the state constitution to expand the government's regulatory powers.<ref>Gray 1977, p. 290.</ref>

Marshall was a strong opponent of Indiana's recently passed [[eugenics]] and [[Compulsory sterilization|sterilization laws]], and ordered state institutions not to follow them.{{sfn|Paul|1965|p=343}} He was an early, high-profile opponent of eugenics laws, and he carried his opposition into the vice-presidency.<ref>Gray 1977, p. 289.</ref> His governorship was the first in which no state executions took place, due to his opposition to [[capital punishment]] and his practice of pardoning and commuting the sentences of people condemned to execution.{{sfn|Quayle Museum staff|2010}} He regularly attacked corporations and used recently created antitrust laws to attempt to break several large businesses.<ref name = g238/> He participated in a number of ceremonial events, including laying the final [[gold]]en brick to complete the [[Indianapolis Motor Speedway]] in 1909.<ref>Gray 1994, p. 14.</ref>

Democratic Party campaign literature emphasized Marshall's record as governor, with one Democratic textbook from 1912 listing various laws enacted during his time in office by his instance. These included acts to investigate industrial and agricultural education; to permit night schools In cities; to prevent traffic in white slaves; to establish uniform weights and measures; to provide police court matrons; to protect against loan sharks; to strengthen the pure food act; to establish public play grounds; to provide free treatment for [[Rabies|hydrophobia]]; to regulate the sale of cocaine and other drugs; to prevent blindness at birth; to require hygienic schoolhouses to permit medical examination of school children; to regulate the sale of cold storage products; to curtail child labor; and to “require medical supplies as part of a train equipment, etc.” The textbook also listed various laws “intended to protect the toilers” that were also championed by Marshall. These included laws to require storm windows for locomotives; to require full switching crews; to require standard cabooses; to require inspection of locomotive boilers; to provide efficient headlights on locomotives; to require safety devices on switch engines; to require full train crews; to establish free employment agencies; to create a bureau of inspection for factories, workshops, mines and boilers; and to “provide a weekly wage; etc.”<ref>The Democratic Text-book 1912, P.70</ref>