"Individual choice" has its limits if one expects to live in a community.
I have said it before, but I'll say it again:
The megacapitalists had a very long run at "individual choice". What they chose was to keep their stuff and screw their employees. The people we know now as the Progressives from the turn of the 20th century were not social engineers; they were missionaries without the funds they needed to do the work that needed to be done. We would not have had government stepping in to take care of the poor and the ill and the oppressed if that care had been offered voluntarily.
The New Deal came about because the Old Deal was a rotten one. The various civil rights movements of the '60s came about because privilege was concentrated in one group. And you're right: I think those are good things.