The entire banking movement, at all crucial stages, was centralized in the hands of a few men who for years were linked, ideologically and personally, with one another.
Gabriel KolkoDespite the large number of mergers, and the growth in the absolute size of many corporations, the dominant tendency in the American economy at the beginning of [the 20th] century was toward growing competition. Competition was unacceptable...it was not the existence of monopoly that caused the federal government to intervene in the economy, but the lack of it.
Gabriel Kolko