The Rise of Industry: 1860 - 1900 by James Lincoln Collier

Author:James Lincoln Collier
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: AudioGO
Published: 2000-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Corporations, according to capitalist theory, were supposed to operate for the public benefit, but often they did not. Cornelius Vanderbilt, another of the "robber barons," expressed the attitude of many such men when he said, "The public be damned."

But the corporations—or the men who ran them—also brought a change of attitude to America, which was not always a blessing. As we have seen, the corporations originally were given certain advantages, like limited liability and liquidity, because they were supposed to be doing things that were for the public good. But by the time Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Vanderbilt were trying to create their monopolies in oil, steel, and railroads, men running the corporations had abandoned the idea that they ought to be working for the public good. Indeed one of them, Cornelius Vanderbilt, when once asked about it, said flatly, "The public be damned." To these people, the first job of the corporations was to make profits for the owners, that is, those who held stock in them. The interests of others, like the employees, the suppliers, the customers, and the nation as a whole, came second, or in many cases not at all.

In any case, for better or worse, by 1900 the great corporations had come to stay. But any sweeping change like this produces problems: The new industrial system brought not prosperity, but troubles and woe to millions of Americans who did not share in the wealth.

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