http://politicalloudmouth.com/anti-monopoly-laws-were-a-crazy-liberal-idea/It was a time of considerable anxiety for many ordinary Americans. As the economy whip-sawed from prosperity to ruin, a few individuals just got richer and richer by controlling huge corporations that seemed to run, not just the economy, but the entire nation through the superior access that their large fortunes bought them to public officials.
The year? You guess 2011? Try 1890.
That was the year in which Congress passed the Sherman Anti-trust Act, the nation’s first major legislation to prevent the creation of monopolies, still in effect today, and the basis for federal review of mergers and acquisitions among large corporations, such as AT&T’s purchase of T-Mobile. Substantially amended during the presidency of Woodrow Wilson with the Clayton Anti-Trust Act, the Sherman Act reflects a fundamental piece of wisdom that is as relevant today as it was then: that very large concentrations of economic power threaten everyone else’s freedom, such that it is entirely reasonable to use the power of government to prevent such concentrations.
Everyone knows that “big government” is the enemy of freedom, right?
More at the link --