Most important was the Clayton Act of 1914, which largely put the trust issue to rest by spelling out the specific unfair practices that business were not allowed to engage in.
[7][8] By the end of the Wilson Administration, a significant amount of progressive legislation had been passed, affecting not only economic and constitutional affairs, but farmers, labor, veterans, the environment, and conservation as well.
The reform agenda actually put into legislation by Wilson, however, did not extend as far as what Roosevelt had called for but had never actually passed, such as a standard 40-hour work week, minimum wage laws, and a federal system of social insurance.
[14]In his acceptance speech for the Democratic nomination, Wilson argued in favor of labor legislation, stating that The working people of America, — if they must be distinguished from the minority that constitutes the rest of it, — are, of course, the backbone of the Nation.
No law that safeguards their lives, that improves the physical and moral conditions under which they live, that makes their hours of labor rational and tolerable, that gives them freedom to act in their own interest, and that protects them where they cannot protect themselves, can properly be regarded as class legislation or as anything but as a measure taken in the interest of the whole people, whose partnership in right action we are trying to establish and make real and practical.
[22] In the same notes Wilson argued that “Charities, e.g., should be taken from the sphere of private, voluntary organization and endeavour and made the imperative legal duty of the Whole.
Relief of the poor, and a bettering of the conditions in which they live is as much a governmental function as Education (coming under the head, not only of human duty, but also of social sanitation).
[26] While serving as governor of New Jersey, Wilson's views on welfare were arguably reflected in the platform adopted by the New Jersey Democratic Party in 1912, the authorship of which has been attributed to Wilson,[27] which included a plank calling for more intervention in the field of health and welfare: We also favour and endorse the efforts which our State and its various institutions are making for the preservation of the public health, and for the purpose of effectually coping with the problem of tuberculosis we believe in the establishment of a system of expert medical inspection of all schoolchildren and the enlargement under expert supervision of a sanitarium for those affected with incipient tuberculosis.
To those unfortunates who by reasons of defect of intellect, poverty or enforced confinement are at the present time wards of the State we favour their maintenance and the bestowal upon them of all care possible, so that their deficiencies may be remedied or their condition at least ameliorated.”[28]Wilson expressed similar views in 1913, arguing that workers had the right to a living wage and noting: There can be no equality of opportunity, the first essential of justice in the body politic, if men and women and children be not shielded in their lives, their very vitality, from the consequences of great industrial and social processes which they can not alter, control or singly cope with.
The State is gradually growing, through the development of its so-called police power, into the stature and dignity of 'parens patrae,' guardian or custodian of the public welfare.
Despite this, the New Freedom did much to extend the power of the federal government in social and economic affairs, and arguably paved the way for future reform programs such as the New Deal and the Great Society.