James Clark McReynolds Quotes

The one thing that I know government is good for is countervailing against monopoly. It's not great at that either, but it's the only force I know that is fairly reliable.

The only way you can stop the unregulated monopoly ... from gouging ... is to introduce competition.

Rules designed to ensure competition ensure that innovators with new ideas can challenge incumbents on a level playing field.

The Sherman Act was designed to be a comprehensive charter of economic liberty aimed at preserving free and unfettered competition as the rule of trade. It rests on the premise that the unrestrained interaction of competitive forces will yield the best allocation of our economic resources, the lowest prices, the highest quality and the greatest material progress, while at the same time providing an environment conducive to the preservation of our democratic political and social institutions.

Consumers depend on us to make sure that competition is fair and open, and it's my responsibility to make that happen.

For consumers to benefit from technology, there has to be fair and open competition. Fair and open competition is the only course we know that can lead to meaningful innovation.

The economy is governed through cartel agreements and monopoly. The attorney general is the one who's controlling funds. There is no free business in Georgia.

We should get rid of laws that retard competition and let these financial companies [large banking corporations] go at each other.

Competition does a much more effective job than government at protecting consumers.

The first is determining how to deal with the great industrial combinations is knowledge of the facts—publicity.

Antitrust is the way that the government promotes markets when there are market failures. It has nothing to do with the idea of free information.

Amazon is not a monopoly or a monopsony, and even if it were, that by itself isn't illegal.

The standard formulation on remedy is that it ought to cure past violations and prevent their recurrence. That's what antitrust is all about.

As someone with a deep faith in competition and the market, I also know that markets only work with tough enforcement of the rules that guarantee competition and fair play - and that the pressure to break those rules only gets stronger as the amount of money involved gets larger.

I talked about the barriers created by monopolies. I said that it was the role of government to break up these monopolies and that we couldn't do it alone.

We have protected our domestic industry far too long and they were happily dishing out substandard goods. Now, they see red when there is competition

…society in a modern democracy will not permit unregulated control over production and sale of its necessities.

Free prices are the price of freedom.

We ... deceive ourselves in believing that competition can secure for the public fair treatment in such cases.

There must be reasonable restrictions upon competition else we shall see competition destroyed.

Tough enforcement of the antitrust laws can help prevent a recurrence of inflation by attacking abuses of economic power.

The people were told in the last campaign that trusts [corporate monopolies] were a natural evolution, and that the only way to deal with them was to regulate them. The people are tired of being told such things. What they want is the kind of opportunity that formerly existed in this country.

What anyone has he may value at what rate he will and transgresses not against justice if he sells it at any price provided he makes no distinction of buyers but parts with it as cheap to this as he would to any other buyer.

There are certain agreements or practices which because of their pernicious effect on competition and lack of any redeeming virtue are conclusively …. Among the practices which the courts have heretofore deemed to be unlawful in and of themselves are price fixing, division of markets, group boycotts, and tying arrangements.

Possible economies cannot be used as a defense to illegality. Congress was aware that some mergers which lessen competition may also result in economies but it struck the balance in favor of protecting competition.