7. “We wish to control big business so as to secure among other things good wages for the wage-workers and reasonable prices for the consumers. Wherever in any business the prosperity of the businessman is obtained by lowering the wages of his workmen and charging an excessive price to the consumers we wish to interfere and stop such practices.”
During a speech at the 1912 Progressive Party Convention, Roosevelt made this quote, invoking socialist ideas, as many modern progressive republicans would agree with him on. Through his economic paternalism, Roosevelt communicates that it is up to the state to determine whether prices or wages are “fair.” He thereby expresses his disapproval of the natural right of freedom to contract, a right which we as libertarians recognize as absolutely fundamental in a free society.
