Federal Trade Commission

Examples of Federal Trade Commission in the following topics:

• Anti-Trust Laws

  • Wilson sought to encourage competition and curb trusts by using the Federal Trade Commission to enforce the Clayton Antitrust Act.
  • For instance, the 1916 Federal Farm Loan Act provided for issuance of low-cost, long term mortgages to farmers, and the Adamson Act imposed an eight-hour workday in the railroad industry (prompted by the 1916 summer strike by railroad employees).
  • In addition to the Underwood tariff, which seemed to finally resolve the political debate over tariff rates, and the creation of the Federal Reserve, Wilson also supported anti-trust legislation.
  • Wilson deviated from his presidential predecessors, who relied on lawsuits to break trusts and monopolies, by founding a new trustbusting approach through encouraging competition through the Federal Trade Commission.
  • The Federal Trade Commission effectively restricted unfair trade practices and enforced the 1914 Clayton Antitrust Act.

• Wilsonian Progressivism

  • Included among these were the Federal Reserve Act, Federal Trade Commission Act, the Clayton Antitrust Act, and the Federal Farm Loan Act.
  • Congress rejected proposals for a tariff board to scientifically fix rates, but did set up a study commission to monitor them.
  • Wilson deviated from his presidential predecessors, who relied on lawsuits to break trusts and monopolies, by founding a new trustbusting approach through encouraging competition through the Federal Trade Commission.
  • The Federal Trade Commission effectively restricted unfair trade practices and enforced the 1914 Clayton Antitrust Act.
  • Despite this, Wilson did much to extend the power of the federal government in social and economic affairs, and paved the way for future federal reform programs such as the New Deal.

• The Wilson Administration

  • This included the Federal Reserve Act, the Underwood Tariff, the Federal Trade Commission, the Clayton Antitrust Act, and the Adamson Act.
  • In late 1913, Wilson secured passage of the Federal Reserve Act, an Act of Congress that created the Federal Reserve System, the central banking system of the U.S., and granted it the legal authority to issue currency.
  • To create the Federal Reserve System, he had to negotiate a compromise between conservative Republicans (led by Senator Nelson W.
  • A complex business-government partnership that to this day dominates the financial world, the Federal Reserve System played a major role in financing the Allied and American war efforts during the two World Wars.
  • Wilson also pursued a new approach to encouraging competition through the Federal Trade Commission.

• The Republican Era

  • Harding's creation of the Budget Bureau was a major economic accomplishment that reformed and streamlined wasteful federal spending.
  • In addition to these tax cuts, Coolidge proposed reductions in federal expenditures and retiring some of the federal debt.
  • They reduced taxes again by passing the Revenue Acts of 1926 and 1928, all the while continuing to keep spending down so as to reduce the overall federal debt.
  • With the exception of favoring increased tariffs, Coolidge disdained regulation, and carried on this belief by appointing commissioners to the Federal Trade Commission and the Interstate Commerce Commission who did little to restrict the activities of businesses under their jurisdiction.
  • In his veto message, he expressed the belief that the bill would do nothing to help farmers, benefiting only exporters and expanding the federal bureaucracy.

• Regulation

  • Many of today's U.S. regulatory agencies were created during these years, including the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Federal Trade Commission.
  • The federal government should allow these companies to exist but regulate them for the public interest.
  • Passed under the presidency of Benjamin Harrison, it prohibits certain business activities that federal government regulators deem to be anti-competitive, and requires the federal government to investigate and pursue trusts.
  • The law attempts to prevent the artificial raising of prices by restriction of trade or supply.
  • The United States Employees' Compensation Act is a federal law enacted on September 7, 1916.

• The Coal Strike of 1902

  • The Anthracite Coal Strike of 1902 is significant as the first labor episode in which the federal government intervened as a mediator.
  • This forced President Roosevelt to intervene with an arbitration commission that suspended the strike.
  • The strike never resumed, as the miners received more pay for fewer hours, however, the mine owners refused to recognize the trade union as a bargaining agent.
  • In the end, however, the rhetoric of both sides made little difference to the Commission.
  • Organized labor celebrated the outcome as a victory for the UMWA and American Federation of Labor unions generally.

• The Tariff

  • The United States Revenue Act of 1913 re-imposed the federal income tax, and lowered basic tariff rates from 40% to 25%.
  • Congress rejected proposals for a tariff board to scientifically fix rates, but did set up a study commission to monitor them.
  • The Act also provided for the re-institution of a federal income tax as a means of compensating for anticipated lost revenue due to the reduction of tariff duties.
  • Under the Revenue Act, the incomes of couples exceeding $4,000, as well as those of single persons earning $3,000 or more, were subject to a one percent federal tax.
  • Within a few years after the Revenue Act was implemented, the federal income tax replaced tariffs as the chief source of revenue for the government.

• Debt and the Stock Market Plunge

  • The United States became the world's largest debtor, borrowing domestically and internationally to finance the federal deficit.
  • During the Reagan Administration, federal receipts grew at an average rate of 8.2% (2.5% attributed to higher Social Security receipts), and federal outlays grew at an annual rate of 7.1%.
  • Reagan reappointed Paul Volcker as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and then appointed monetarist Alan Greenspan to succeed Volcker in 1987.
  • Greenspan preserved the core New Deal safeguards, such as the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the GI Bill and Social Security, while rolling back what he viewed as the excesses of 1960's and 1970's liberal policies.
  • Such programs included Social Security, Medicaid, Food Stamps, and federal education programs.

• Republican Reform Under Harrison

  • Harrison appointed Theodore Roosevelt and Hugh Smith Thompson, both reformers, to the Civil Service Commission, but otherwise did little to further the reform cause.
  • In addition to providing pensions to disabled Civil War veterans, regardless of the cause of their disability, the Act depleted some of the troublesome federal budget surplus.
  • The 51st Congress was responsible for a number of pieces of landmark legislation, many of which expanded the authority of the federal government.
  • The Sherman Antitrust Act, which prohibited business combinations that restricted trade, and the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, which required the U.S. government to mint silver.
  • Henry Cabot Lodge sponsored a so-called Lodge Bill that would have established federal supervision of Congressional elections so as to prevent the disfranchisement of southern blacks.

• The End of Reconstruction

  • After the election of 1876, the Democrats were promised that federal troops would be removed from the remaining Southern states.
  • Grant signed the Electoral Commission Act that set up a 15-member commission to settle the disputed 1876 election of 8 Republicans and 7 Democrats.
  • The Electoral Commission awarded Rutherford B.
  • The Democrats had little leverage—they could not block Hayes' election, but they were mollified by the implicit, "back room" deal that federal troops would be removed on the condition that the Southern states pledged to protect the lives of African Americans.
  • Hayes's friends also let it be known that he would promote Federal aid for internal improvements, including help for a railroad in Texas, and name a Southerner to his cabinet.