The Business Campaign
Against Competition,
1918–1938

Butler Shaffer

The Ludwig von Mises Institute
Auburn, Alabama
2008

©1997 by Associated University Presses, Inc.

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To the memory
and the investigative spirit
of John T. Flynn

Acknowledgments

I wish to acknowledge my gratitude to a number of persons whose assistance was helpful in the bringing of this book to publication.

First, I would like to thank Robert Love who, knowing of my interest in this subject matter, first encouraged me to write this book more years ago than I care to remember. Shortly thereafter, I received valuable assistance from the late F. A. Harper and Kenneth Templeton, who helped me to focus the scope of this inquiry.

In Restraint
of Trade

Introduction

[T]he forces which count toward a readjustment of institutions in any modern industrial community are chiefly economic forces; or more specifically, these forces take the form of pecuniary pressure. Such a readjustment as is here contemplated is substantially a change in men’s views as to what is good and right, and the means through which a change is wrought in men’s apprehension of what is good and right is in large part the pressure of pecuniary exigencies.

—Thorstein Veblen

1
Making the World Safe from Competition

The evolution of society is substantially a process of mental adaptation on the part of individuals under the stress of circumstances which will no longer tolerate habits of thought formed under and conforming to a different set of circumstances in the past.

—Thorstein Veblen

2
Trade Associations and Codes of Ethics

The group’s accepted scheme of life is the consensus of views held by the body of these individuals as to what is right, good, expedient, and beautiful in the way of human life.

—Thorstein Veblen

3
Political Alternatives

If any portion or class of society is sheltered from the action of the environment in any essential respect, that portion of the community, or that class, will adapt its views and its scheme of life more tardily to the altered general situation; it will in so far tend to retard the process of social transformation.

—Thorstein Veblen

4
Under the Blue Eagle and Beyond

For no form of co-operation, small or great, can be carried on without regulation, and an implied submission to the regulating agencies.

—Herbert Spencer