Wealth Against Commonwealth

About this film

LibriVox recording of Wealth Against Commonwealth by Henry Demarest Lloyd. Read in English by Bryan Travis. Wealth Against Commonwealth documented the economic, social, and political harms of the oil and railroad monopolies during the United States Gilded Age from the 1870s to the 1890s. By concentrating and controlling large sums of wealth, power, and goods among a few corporations and industrialists, journalist and author Henry Demarest Lloyd argued monopolies threaten the well-being of society and democracy, the “common wealth.” Through personal interviews, investigative reporting, court and legislative records, Lloyd revealed how the oil and railroad trusts, among others, actively suppressed competition and sought to control the supply of commodities to increase demand and prices artificially. Lloyd presented evidence from all levels of economic scale and stakeholders, from independent oil producers and refiners to transportation industries, from small towns to nations, from state and local courts to national legislatures. Henry Demarest Lloyd was a political activist and investigative journalist, or “muckraker.” His activism, criticism of monopolies, and support of organized l…

Directors & creators

Henry Demarest Lloyd

Subjects

librivox; audiobooks;politics; socialism; muckraker; standard oil; capitalism; trusts; monopolies; progressive movement

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