What trusts did Roosevelt work to break up?
Theodore Roosevelt is most famous for his actions in breaking up Northern Securities, a trust headed by financier J.P. Morgan that had established a monopoly over railroad shipping in the Northwest. Roosevelt brought suit against Northern Securities and, despite the protestations of Morgan, ultimately prevailed in a Supreme Court decision that dissolved the trust. Because Morgan was so prominent, this action alone cemented Roosevelt's reputation as a "trustbuster." In truth, Roosevelt accepted that big corporations were a fact of life in the new industrial world, and he generally held that they should be managed rather than destroyed. By far the most significant step he took as a trustbuster was the creation of the Interstate Commerce Commission. The ICC, created by the Hepburn Act in 1906, regulated railroad mergers and acquisitions to conform with anti-trust laws. Another famous anti-trust case under Roosevelt was Swift & Company v. United States, decided by the Supreme Court in 1905. This case hinged on price-fixing and other monopolistic practices by Swift & Company, a huge meatpacking firm. Ironically, the presidency of William Howard Taft, Roosevelt's successor, featured almost twice as many anti-trust cases as that of the so-called "trustbuster" himself.
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