Robber baron (industrialist)
Robber baron is a term first applied as
Usage
The term robber baron derives from the
The metaphor appeared as early as February 9, 1859, when
The first such usage was against Vanderbilt, for taking money from high-priced, government-subsidized shippers, in order to not compete on their routes. Political cronies had been granted special shipping routes by the state, but told legislators their costs were so high that they needed to charge high prices and still receive extra money from the taxpayers as funding. Vanderbilt's private shipping company began running the same routes, charging a fraction of the price, making a large profit without taxpayer subsidy. The state-funded shippers then began paying Vanderbilt money to not ship on their route. A critic of this tactic drew a political comic depicting Vanderbilt as a feudal robber baron extracting a toll.
In his 1934 book The Robber Barons: The Great American Capitalists 1861-1901,
Charles R. Geisst says, "in a Darwinist age, Vanderbilt developed a reputation as a plunderer who took no prisoners."[7] Hal Bridges said that the term represented the idea that "business leaders in the United States from about 1865 to 1900 were, on the whole, a set of avaricious rascals who habitually cheated and robbed investors and consumers, corrupted government, fought ruthlessly among themselves, and in general carried on predatory activities comparable to those of the robber barons of medieval Europe."[8]
Critique
Historian Richard White argues that the builders of the transcontinental railroads have attracted a great deal of attention but the interpretations are contradictory: at first very hostile and then very favorable. At first, White says, they were depicted as:
Robber Barons, standing for a Gilded Age of corruption, monopoly, and rampant individualism. Their corporations were the Octopus, devouring all in its path. In the twentieth century and the twenty-first they became entrepreneurs, necessary business revolutionaries, ruthlessly changing existing practices and demonstrating the protean nature of American capitalism. Their new corporations also transmuted and became manifestations of the "Visible Hand," managerial rationality that eliminated waste, increased productivity and brought bourgeois values to replace those of financial buccaneers.[9]
1860s–1920s
Historian John Tipple examined the writings of the 50 most influential analysts who used the robber baron model in the 1865–1914 period. He argued:
The originators of the Robber Baron concept were not the injured, the poor, the faddists, the jealous, or a dispossessed elite, but rather a frustrated group of observers led at last by protracted years of harsh depression to believe that the American dream of abundant prosperity for all was a hopeless myth. ... Thus the creation of the Robber Baron stereotype seems to have been the product of an impulsive popular attempt to explain the shift in the structure of American society in terms of the obvious. Rather than make the effort to understand the intricate processes of change, most critics appeared to slip into the easy vulgarizations of the "devil-view" of history which ingenuously assumes that all human misfortunes can be traced to the machinations of an easily located set of villains—in this case, the big businessmen of America. This assumption was clearly implicit in almost all of the criticism of the period.[10]
1930s–1970s
American historian Matthew Josephson further popularized the term during the Great Depression in his book, published in 1934.[6] Josephson's view was that, like the medieval German princes, American big businessmen had amassed huge fortunes immorally, unethically, and unjustly. This theme was popular during the Great Depression of the 1930s, when the public often expressed scorn for big business. Historian Steve Fraser notes that the mood was sharply hostile toward big business:
Biographies of Mellon, Carnegie and Rockefeller were often laced with moral censure, warning that "tories of industry" were a threat to democracy and that parasitism, aristocratic pretension and tyranny are an inevitable consequence of concentrated wealth, whether accumulated dynastically or more impersonally by faceless corporations. This scholarship, and the cultural persuasion of which it was an expression, drew on a deeply rooted feeling that was partly religious and partly egalitarian and democratic, a sensibility stretching back to William Jennings Bryan, Andrew Jackson, and Tom Paine.[11]
However, contrary opinions by academic historians began to appear as the Depression ended. Business historian Allan Nevins advanced the "Industrial Statesman" thesis in his John D. Rockefeller: The Heroic Age of American Enterprise (2 vols., 1940), arguing that while Rockefeller engaged in unethical and illegal business practices, he also helped to bring order to the industrial chaos of the day. According to Nevins, it was Gilded Age capitalists who, by imposing order and stability on competitive business, made the United States the foremost economy by the 20th century.[12]
In 1958 Bridges reported that, "The most vehement and persistent controversy in business history has been that waged by the critics and defenders of the "robber baron" concept of the American businessman."
Contemporary use
In the popular culture the metaphor continues. In 1975 the student body of Stanford University voted to use "Robber Barons" as the nickname for their sports teams. However, school administrators disallowed it, saying it was disrespectful to the school's founder, Leland Stanford.[15]
In academia, the education division of the National Endowment for the Humanities has prepared a lesson plan for schools asking whether "robber baron" or "captain of industry" is the better term. They state:
In this lesson, you and your students will attempt to establish a distinction between robber barons and captains of industry. Students will uncover some of the less honorable deeds as well as the shrewd business moves and highly charitable acts of the great industrialists and financiers. It has been argued that only because such people were able to amass great amounts of capital could our country become the world's greatest industrial power. Some of the actions of these men, which could only happen in a period of economic laissez faire, resulted in poor conditions for workers, but in the end, may also have enabled our present day standard of living.[16]
This debate about the morality of certain business practices has continued in the popular culture, as in the performances in Europe in 2012 by Bruce Springsteen, who sang about bankers as "greedy thieves" and "robber barons".[17] During the Occupy Wall Street protests of 2011, the term was used by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in his attacks on Wall Street.[18]
The metaphor has also been used to characterize Russian oligarchs allied to Vladimir Putin.[19]
The leaders of Big Tech companies have all been described as being modern-day robber barons, particularly Jeff Bezos because of his influence on his newspaper, The Washington Post.[20] Their rising wealth and power stands in contrast with the shrinking middle class.[21]
In contrast, conservative American historian
List of businessmen labelled as robber barons
Individuals identified in Josephson's Robber Barons (1934):
- John Jacob Astor (real estate, fur) – New York
- Andrew Carnegie (steel) – Pittsburgh and New York
- Jay Cooke (finance) – Philadelphia
- Charles Crocker (railroads) – California
- Edward L. Doheny (oil) – California
- Daniel Drew (finance) – New York
- James Buchanan Duke (tobacco, electric power) – Durham, North Carolina
- James Fisk (finance) – New York
- Henry Morrison Flagler (Standard Oil, railroads) – New York and Florida[23]
- Henry Clay Frick (steel) – Pittsburgh and New York
- John Warne Gates (barbed wire, oil) – Texas[24]
- Jay Gould (railroads) – New York[25]
- E. H. Harriman (railroads) – New York[26]
- James J. Hill (fuel, coal, steamboats, railroads) – St Paul, Minnesota
- Collis Potter Huntington (railroads) – California, Virginia, West Virginia
- Andrew Mellon (finance, oil) – Pittsburgh
- J. P. Morgan (finance, industrial consolidation) – New York
- John D. Rockefeller (Standard Oil) – Cleveland, Ohio
- Henry Huttleston Rogers (Standard Oil, copper), New York[27]
- Thomas Fortune Ryan (public transit, tobacco) – New York
- Russell Sage (finance, railroads) – New York
- Charles M. Schwab (steel) – Pittsburgh and New York
- Leland Stanford (railroads) – California
- Cornelius Vanderbilt (water transport, railroads) – New York[28]
- Peter Widener(public transportation) – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Charles Tyson Yerkes (street railroads) – Chicago[29]
Identified as "robber barons" by other sources:
- William A. Clark (copper) – Butte, Montana[30]
- James Dunsmuir (coal, lumber) – Victoria, BC Canada[31]
- Marshall Field (retail) – Chicago[32]
- William Randolph Hearst (media mogul) – California[33][34]
- Charles T. Hinde (railroads, water transport, shipping, hotels) – Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, California
- Mark Hopkins Jr. (railroads) – California
- John C. Osgood (coal mining, iron) – Colorado[35]
- Henry B. Plant (railroads) – Florida[36]
- A. S. W. Rosenbach (antique bookdealer) – Philadelphia[37]
- Joseph Seligman (banking) – New York
- John D. Spreckels (water transport, railroads, sugar) – California
Contemporary:
- Jeff Bezos (Amazon, The Washington Post) - Washington state[38]
- Elon Musk (technology, automotive industry) - California[39]
See also
References
- The Atlantic Monthly. C (November 1907): 683.
We hear now on all sides the term "Robber Barons" applied to some of the great capitalists"... quoting the August 1870 issue... The old robber barons of the Middle Ages who plundered sword in hand and lance in rest were more honest than this new aristocracy of swindling millionaires.
- ^ The Atlantic Monthly. C (December 1907): 812–818.
- ^ a b Worth Robert Miller, Populist cartoons: an illustrated history of the third-party movement in the 1890s (2011) p. 13
- ^ Alden, Henry Mills (November 1894). "A Romance of the New Era". Harper's New Monthly Magazine. LXXXIX (DXXXIV). Retrieved 2009-07-10.
- ^ T. J. Stiles, "Robber Barons or Captains of Industry?" , History Now 24, June 2010
- ^ a b Matthew Josephson, The Robber Barons: The Great American Capitalists, 1861–1901, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1934.
- ISBN 978-0-19-511512-3.
- ^ Hal Bridges, "The robber baron concept in American history." Business History Review 32#1 (1958): 1–13, page 1.
- ISBN 978-0393342376.
- ^ John Tipple, "The anatomy of prejudice: Origins of the robber baron legend." Business History Review 33#4 (1959): 510–523, quoting pp. 510, 521.
- ^ Steve Fraser,"The Misunderstood Robber Baron: On Cornelius Vanderbilt: T.J. Stiles's The First Tycoon is a gilded portrait of the robber baron Cornelius Vanderbilt," The Nation Nov. 11, 2009
- ^ Allan Nevins, John D. Rockefeller: The Heroic Age of American Enterprise, 2 vols., New York, C. Scribner's Sons, 1940.
- ^ Bridges, "The robber baron concept in American history." p. 1
- ^ Richard White, Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America (2011) pp. xxxi, 234, 508
- ^ John R. Thelin, "California and the Colleges," California Historical Quarterly (1977) 56#2 pp. 140–63 [149].
- ^ "The Industrial Age in America: Robber Barons and Captains of Industry" EDSITEment! The Best of the humanities on the web."
- ^ Erik Kirschbaum, "Bruce Springsteen: Bankers Are 'Greedy Thieves'" Reuters May 31, 2012
- ISBN 978-1784784195.
- ^ David O. Whitten, "Russian robber barons: Moscow business, American style." European Journal of Law and Economics 13#3 (2002): 193–201.
- ^ Dana Milbank, "How did tech CEOs do on Capitol Hill? Google 'robber barons.'" The Washington Post Jul. 29, 2020
- ^ Brett Arends, "Why the middle class is shrinking," MarketWatch Apr. 22, 2019
- ISBN 978-0963020307
- ^ David Leon Chandler, Henry Flagler: The Astonishing Life and Times of the Visionary Robber Baron Who Founded Florida (1986)
- ISBN 9781438130224.
- ^ Edward Renehan, Dark Genius of Wall Street: The Misunderstood Life of Jay Gould, King of the Robber Barons (2005)
- The World's Work: A History of Our Time. XIII: 8437–8445. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
- ISBN 9780786472611.
- ^ T. J. Stiles, The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt (2010) p 328
- ^ John Franch, Robber Baron: The Life of Charles Tyson Yerkes (2008)
- ISBN 9780758286369.
- ISBN 9781843532453.
- ISBN 9780252035043.
- ISBN 9781844674640.
- ISBN 9780091949310.
- ^ "The Redstone Story re-lives the industrialization of the West" Redstone, Colorado website, history
- ISBN 9780684192468.
- ISBN 9780313266751.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
wp
was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ "Tesla CEO Elon Musk quashes claim he is 'modern-day robber baron'"
Further reading
- ISBN 1400032423
- Bridges, Hal. (1958) "The Robber Baron Concept in American History" Business History Review (1958) 32#1 pp. 1–13 in JSTOR
- Burlingame, D.F. Ed. (2004). Philanthropy in America: A comprehensive historical encyclopaedia (3 vol. ABC Clio).[ISBN missing]
- Cochran, Thomas C. (1949) "The Legend of the Robber Barons." Explorations in Economic History 1#5 (1949) online.
- Fraser, Steve. (2015). The Age of Acquiescence: The Life and Death of American Resistance to Organized Wealth and Power ISBN 0316185434
- Harvey, Charles, et al. "Andrew Carnegie and the foundations of contemporary entrepreneurial philanthropy." Business History 53.3 (2011): 425–450. online
- Jones, Peter d'A. ed. (1968). The Robber Barons Revisited (1968) excerpts from primary and secondary sources.[ISBN missing]
- Marinetto, M. (1999). "The historical development of business philanthropy: Social responsibility in the new corporate economy" Business History 41#4, 1–20.
- Ostrower, F. (1995). Why the wealthy give: The culture of elite philanthropy (Princeton UP).[ISBN missing]
- Ostrower, F. (2002). Trustees of culture: Power, wealth and status on elite arts boards (U of Chicago: Press).[ISBN missing]
- Josephson, Matthew. (1934). The Robber Barons: The Great American Capitalists, 1861–1901[ISBN missing]
- Taylor, Marilyn L.; Robert J. Strom; David O. Renz (2014). Handbook of Research on Entrepreneurs: Engagement in Philanthropy: Perspectives. Edward Elgar. pp. 1–8. ISBN 978-1783471010.
- Wren, D.A. (1983) "American business philanthropy and higher education in the nineteenth century" Business History Review. 57#3 321–346.
- ISBN 0060838655
External links
- Full Show: The New Robber Barons. Moyers & Company. December 19, 2014. Interview with historian Steve Fraser
- Industrial Age in America: Robber Barons or Captains of Industry EDSITEment lesson from National Endowment for the Humanities
- Robber Barons, Oil, and Power from 1860 - Daniel Sheehan, University of California Santa Cruz, "The Trajectory of Justice in America 2019, Class #5"
- college-level lectures on Robber Barons