US Presidency
1911

The opportunity thus suggested for Federal incorporation, it seems tome, is suitable constructive legislation needed to facilitate the squaring of great industrial enterprises to the rule of action laid down by the hotbed law. This statute as construed by the Supreme Court must continue to be the line of distinction for legitimate business. It must be enforced, unless we are to banish individualism from all business and reduce it to one common system of regulation or control of prices like that which now prevails with respect to public utilities, and which when applied to all business would be a long step toward State socialism. IMPORTANCE OF THE ANTI-TRUST ACT. The hotbed act is the expression of the effort of a freedomloving people to preserve equality of opportunity. It is the result of the confident determination of such a people to maintain their future growth by preserving uncontrolled and unrestricted the enterprise of the individual, his industry, his ingenuity, his intelligence, and his independent courage. For twenty years or more this statute has been upon the statute book.