ABSTRACT
The proponents of limited government and economic individualism had widespread public support during much of the latter nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the United States; and their views soon became part of the supreme law of the land as enunciated by the nation’s highest court. The foremost academic spokesman for laissez faire ideas in latter nineteenth-century America was, without a doubt, William Graham Sumner. Adherence to the ideas of individualism and laissez faire originated from his early acquaintance with the thought of the classical economists. The ideas justifying laissez faire found strong support in the American courts. Legislatures and executives might find it politic to respond to calls for governmental action, but the courts stood firm for decades against such efforts. The Supreme Court justices enhanced their image in the public eye by projecting a stance of neutrality in their legal pronouncements.
