goo-goo

The goo-goos, or good government guys, were political groups founded in an era when urban municipal governments in the United States were dominated by machine politics. Goo-goos supported candidates who would fight for political reform. The term was first used in the 1890s by their detractors.

In New York, the exclusive City Club was the domain of "goo-goos," who sponsored "Good Government Clubs" in every assembly district. Their efforts led to the election of a reform mayor in 1894, a setback for the political machine known as Tammany Hall.

Members of several political reform movements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were often labeled as goo-goos, including the Mugwumps and the Progressives. While old political labels like mugwump and progressive have been reinvented several times, and have shifted in meaning as a result, the term goo-goo still has political currency, and has changed little since it was first used in the late 19th century.

In American politics, the term is still used occasionally as a mildly derisive label for highminded citizens or reformers. Mike Royko, a Chicago political columnist of the late 20th century, revived the word without reinventing it. Royko was both a critic and an astute observer of Chicago's machine politics. When Royko wrote about the "goo-goos" along Lake Shore Drive, he may even have agreed with them, but his heart and soul were with Slats Grobnik, his fictional Chicagoan who was very cynical about them.

Literary examples

• In John Steinbeck's novella, Of Mice and Men, the worker Whit approves of a whore house that doesn't "let no goo-goos in neither."

References

• James L. Mariner (2004). Grafters and Goo Goos: Corruption and Reform in Chicago, 1833-2003. Bristol, UK: Policy Press. Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 0-8093-2571-3.
• Doug Moe (1999). The World of Mike Royko. University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 0-299-16540-X.
• Bruce M. Stave (1984). Urban Bosses, Machines and Progressive Reformers. Krieger Publishing Company. ISBN 0-89874-119-X.