Square Deal

Uncommon card · No. 194708

The Square Deal was Theodore Roosevelt's domestic program, which reflected his three major goals: conservation of natural resources, corporate law, and consumer protection. These three demands are often referred to as the "three C's" of Roosevelt's Square Deal. Thus, it aimed at helping middle-class citizens and involved attacking plutocracy and bad trusts while at the same time protecting business from the most extreme demands of organized labor. He explained in 1901–1909: When I say that I am for the square deal, I mean not merely that I stand for fair play under the present rules of the game, but that I stand for having those rules changed so as to work for a more substantial equality of opportunity and of reward for equally good service. A Progressive Era Republican, Roosevelt believed in government action to mitigate social evils, and as president he in 1908 denounced "the representatives of predatory wealth" as guilty of "all forms of iniquity from the oppression of wage workers...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Bartholomew, Charles Lewis 'Bart', 1869-1949, Public domain