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CHAPTER 9: DISCONTENT AND REFORMOUTLINE OF U.S. HISTORYinadequate for a 20th-century urbanstate. Years before, in 1873,the celebrated author Mark Twainhad exposed American society tocritical scrutiny in The Gilded Age.Now, trenchant articles dealing withtrusts, high finance, impure foods,and abusive railroad practices beganto appear in the daily newspapersand in such popular magazines asMcClure’s and Collier’s. Their authors,such as the journalist Ida M.Tarbell, who crusaded against theStandard Oil Trust, became knownas “muckrakers.”In his sensational novel, TheJungle, Upton Sinclair exposedunsanitary conditions in the greatChicago meat-packing houses andcondemned the grip of the beeftrust on the nation’s meat supply.Theodore Dreiser, in his novelsThe Financier and The Titan madeit easy for laymen to understandthe machinations of big business.Frank Norris’s The Octopus assailedamoral railroad management; hisThe Pit depicted secret manipulationson the Chicago grain market.Lincoln Steffens’s The Shame of theCities bared local political corruption.This “literature of exposure”roused people to action.The hammering impact of uncompromisingwriters and an increasinglyaroused public spurredpolitical leaders to take practicalmeasures. Many states enacted lawsto improve the conditions underwhich people lived and worked. Atthe urging of such prominent socialcritics as Jane Addams, childlabor laws were strengthened andnew ones adopted, raising age limits,shortening work hours, restrictingnight work, and requiring schoolattendance.ROOSEVELT’S REFORMSBy the early 20th century, most ofthe larger cities and more than halfthe states had established an eighthourday on public works. Equallyimportant were the workman’scompensation laws, which madeemployers legally responsible forinjuries sustained by employees atwork. New revenue laws were alsoenacted, which, by taxing inheritances,incomes, and the property orearnings of corporations, sought toplace the burden of government onthose best able to pay.It was clear to many people —notably President Theodore Rooseveltand Progressive leaders in theCongress (foremost among themWisconsin Senator Robert LaFollette)— that most of the problemsreformers were concerned aboutcould be solved only if dealt with ona national scale. Roosevelt declaredhis determination to give all theAmerican people a “Square Deal.”During his first term, he initiateda policy of increased government supervisionthrough the enforcementof antitrust laws. With his backing,Congress passed the Elkins Act(1903), which greatly restricted therailroad practice of giving rebatesto favored shippers. The act madepublished rates the lawful standard,and shippers equally liable withrailroads for rebates. Meanwhile,Congress had created a new CabinetDepartment of Commerce andLabor, which included a Bureau ofCorporations empowered to investigatethe affairs of large businessaggregations.Roosevelt won acclaim as a“trust-buster,” but his actual attitudetoward big business was complex.Economic concentration, hebelieved, was inevitable. Some trustswere “good,” some “bad.” The taskof government was to make reasonabledistinctions. When, for example,the Bureau of Corporationsdiscovered in 1907 that the AmericanSugar Refining Company hadevaded import duties, subsequentlegal actions recovered more than$4 million and convicted severalcompany officials. The Standard OilCompany was indicted for receivingsecret rebates from the Chicago andAlton Railroad, convicted, and fineda staggering $29 million.Roosevelt’s striking personalityand his trust-busting activities capturedthe imagination of the ordinaryindividual; approval of his progressivemeasures cut across party lines.In addition, the abounding prosperityof the country at this time ledpeople to feel satisfied with the partyin office. He won an easy victory inthe 1904 presidential election.Emboldened by a sweeping electoraltriumph, Roosevelt called forstronger railroad regulation. In June1906 Congress passed the HepburnAct. It gave the Interstate CommerceCommission real authority in regulatingrates, extended the commission’sjurisdiction, and forced therailroads to surrender their interlockinginterests in steamship linesand coal companies.Other congressional measurescarried the principle of federal controlstill further. The Pure Food andDrug Act of 1906 prohibited the useof any “deleterious drug, chemical,or preservative” in prepared medicinesand foods. The Meat InspectionAct of the same year mandatedfederal inspection of all meat-packingestablishments engaged in interstatecommerce.Conservation of the nation’snatural resources, managed developmentof the public domain, andthe reclamation of wide stretches ofneglected land were among the othermajor achievements of the Rooseveltera. Roosevelt and his aides weremore than conservationists, but giventhe helter-skelter exploitation ofpublic resources that had precededthem, conservation loomed large ontheir agenda. Whereas his predecessorshad set aside 18,800,000 hectaresof timberland for preservationand parks, Roosevelt increased thearea to 59,200,000 hectares. Theyalso began systematic efforts to preventforest fires and to re-timberdenuded tracts.TAFT AND WILSONRoosevelt’s popularity was at itspeak as the campaign of 1908 neared,but he was unwilling to break the196197