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Roosevelt Monopolies Analysis

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Roosevelt was re-elected president of the United States (first time elected) in 1904 partly to break up trusts and monopolies. The public was outraged for decades by the ways trusts and monopolies were cheating in business. Roosevelt felt that the US government was responsible for the falls of many legitimate businesses, because they failed to prosecute trusts and monopolies (Roosevelt 222). As president, Roosevelt pledged to protect small businesses and sue monopolies and trusts by implementing the Sherman Antitrust Act to restore honest commerce and labor conditions. Railroad discrimination continued to exist when Roosevelt came into the presidency after President Mckinley’s assassination. Roosevelt believed that big businesses should …show more content…

Roosevelt, the public, and the railroads shared the commonalities that rates should not be based on shipment size and everyone should pay an uniform rate. Most shippers paid the ‘regular’ price, but favored shippers often got 50-80% discounts. For instance, Utica Dry Goods Merchant paid a rate of 9 cents, when the normal was 33 cents (New York Shipping and Commercial List, August 27, 1879). Other businesses who paid the regular prices felt cheated on, and railroads lost tremendous sums of money giving out rebates. The final Hepburn Committee Report in 1880 stated that railroad shipments obtained much less revenue from oil shipments than they deserved (Hepburn Committee Report, [VI], 40-46). Businesses would also threaten railroads that they would take their businesses elsewhere if they did not receive rebates. A.J. Cassatt, President of Pennsylvania Railroad, wrote letters to Roosevelt, urging him to take action and stop rebates by amending the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 (an act that was suppose to regulate monopolistic practices, but was not enforced by the government) (Cassatt). Rebates would continue to be given until Roosevelt amended the Interstate Commerce Act in 1902 and passed the Elkins Act in 1903. Roosevelt broke up monopolies and trusts because businesses and people were urging him

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First off Franklin Roosevelt aggressively formulated programs and took decisive action to expand role of government. Delegation led to enhanced powers, and Supreme Court eventually allowed the New Deal; power was given to FDR because of the economic crisis of the Great Depression. The New Deal did nothing to ensure that rights guaranteed to all Americans via the Constitution, such as the right to vote and the right to a fair trial, were guaranteed to blacks. Because of this President Roosevelt had to greatly increase the responsibilities of his office. Franklin Roosevelt believed in stretching the presidential powers.

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Known for his tough policy on big corporations, president Theodore Roosevelt took many actions to cut down trust and get rid of government corruption (Outside Evidence). Altogether, the responses and the actions taken by people’s responses did much to change and impact

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In this political cartoon, the image showed Theodore Roosevelt was portrayed as cross-dressing, rock throwing socialist suffragette (Vartanian 2011). The President was popular with the middle class, women, and other reformers because of his support of many of their causes. One such cause being the stirring up of monopolies in large corporations to ensure antitrust laws were not broken. Moreover, the corporations viewed him as a bully in the White House, so Roosevelt embraced the term by using his political stature to force issues he supported, therefore coining the term “bully pulpit” (Schultz 2014). The Hepburn Act of 1906 was developed and used through his administration to limit the prices that railroads could charge and earned him the nickname

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Roosevelt enforced his trust-busting policies heavily to control the amount of power unregulated business have. The Elkins act is a federal law that authorized the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to heavily fine railroads that offered rebates. Rebates are partial refunds or repayments for someone who has paid too much for tax. Railroad companies were not allowed nor permitted to offer rebates and made the Elkins act important. After Roosevelt sponsored this act, he got a popularity boost and made him more likable by the public.

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Roosevelt though for big business make many enemies when persuaded congress to create a Bureau of Corporations to oversee them, then brought an antitrust suit against J.P. Morgan’s Securities Corporations. This didn’t sit well with Morgan who lashed out at the president. Soon after this ordeal the president went on and filed suit against over forty major corporations during his term. Roosevelt valued the poor and middle class both which included working class people. He passed laws to make sure the food and drugs sold in the marketplace were safe by all guidelines and regulations.

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Trusts, or large monopolies, were corporations that combined and lowered their prices to drive competitors out of the business. This infuriated many americans at that time because it allowed such a small number of people to become wealthy, or even successful at all. When Theodore Roosevelt became president, he sympathized with workers unlike most of the presidents in the past who usually tried to help the corporations. As illustrated in Document A, Roosevelt wanted to hunt down the bad trusts ad put a leash on the good ones in order to regulate them. However, it only had a limited effect because the government was unable to control the activity of banks and railroads which were two of the most powerful industries in the world.

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