The progressive area lost wind in the US, mores the pity, whereas in Europe the experience of hardship during the great depression and later WW2 would lead to the fornation of the modern wellfare state. With the war experience came a sense of unity and people were used to an extreme level of government control, so the thinking was, if we can make an effort to win and overcome a world war why not spend some if that level of effort in improving society. In the US that sense of lifting the burden in unity vanished with the post war boom.
Whats amazing is that it became a broad political consensus for decades on that society should change fundamentally and provide a wide range of services for everyone. Now, despite the problems of coupling a high level of redistribution with globalisation, most of us remain fiercely proud of the European model compared to the rest of the world.