The story of healthcare reform in the United states begins not with Obama, Clinton or even Johnson, but almost a century ago, in the years leading up to World War I. Although the Socialist Party of America had called for insurance for workers “against accident, sickness and lack of employment” as early as 1904, it wasn’t until 1912, when the platform of Theodore Roosevelt’s Progressive Party called for a system of health insurance, that it emerged as a major political issue … Read this article in the July 2013 issue of In These Times